Healey eyes Roxbury rec center for shelter site
Families sleeping at Logan ‘isn’t new,’ the governor says
Gov. Maura Healey’s administration is eyeing the Melnea Cass Recreation Center in Roxbury as an overflow site for local and newly-arrived migrant homeless families with emergency shelters at capacity.
The decision to potentially use the center comes as homeless migrant families have been found sleeping on the floor of Logan International Airport’s Terminal E as the waitlist for shelter topped 600 families as of Thursday.
Retired Lt. Gen. Scott Rice, who heads up Massachusetts’ shelter response, confirmed officials were actively looking at the stateowned Melnea Cass Recreation Center, as a temporary overflow site, “especially those staying at Logan Airport overnight.”
“We have been in close discussions with Roxbury elected officials, the Roxbury community, and the City of Boston about this potential temporary site, including how to ensure the continuation of recreation programs,” Rice said in a statement. “Our system is at capacity and there is an urgent need for additional safety-net sites, and we appreciate the collaboration of communities to help us ensure that no family is left out in the cold.”
Massachusetts shelters have been overwhelmed over the past year with a surge in demand driven in-part because of an influx of migrants fleeing their home countries and high housing costs that have affected people already living in the state.
The Healey administration runs three overflow shelter sites that have the capacity to temporarily house 250 families, according to the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities. Two of those sites are at a college in Quincy and a former courthouse in Cambridge.
But with a never-ending demand, families who have been waitlisted for longerterm shelter and have not been able to find a spot at an overflow site are left with few options. Some have turned to Logan Airport, where migrants have been sleeping on a “daily basis,” according to a spokesperson for the Massachusetts Port Authority.
During an interview on WBUR Friday morning, Healey said families sleeping at Logan Airport “isn’t new.”
“People have been at Logan for months now,” she said on Radio Boston. “We continue to see migrants coming into Massachusetts, they’re coming into other states. I talked to governors frequently about the real challenge this is. This is not something that Massachusetts created. It is something that has been created by geopolitical forces by a failure to act on the federal level.”
The Boston Globe first reported the Healey administration was eying the center.
There were 7,521 families in emergency shelters across Massachusetts as of Thursday, according to data maintained by the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities.
Healey proposed to levelfund emergency shelters at $325 million in her fiscal year 2025 state budget, even though her administration projected spending on the system would exceed $900 million.
The first-term Democrat proposed closing nearly all of the spending gap by turning to $873 million in leftover surplus dollars from the pandemic. She pitched Beacon Hill lawmakers on using those monies to fix a budget gap this fiscal year and pay down costs in the next.
But even if the Legislature agrees with the plan, Healey’s budget chief said there would still be a spending gap for shelters and associated services of about $91 million in fiscal year 2025.
Some Republicans on Beacon Hill have criticized the plan.
“Funding for the migrant shelter crisis continues to drain much-needed revenues that would otherwise have been spent on other programs and services, with no end in sight, as evidenced by the Governor’s companion piece of legislation filed today that would empty the Transitional Escrow Fund to pay for this program,” House Minority Leader Brad Jones said in a statement earlier this week.