Mass & Cass

When city workers dismantled the tents in the streets around the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard last December, city officials and civic leaders stressed the importance of a regional approach that would distribute the drug treatment programs and transitional housing from the area to neighborhoods throughout the city and throughout the region.

About seven weeks ahead of Massachusetts’ primary election, candidates presented different approaches to tackle a crisis of mental health, substance use disorders and criminal activity in the area of Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard, also called Mass. and Cass.

A group of Massachusetts elected officials are calling on state and local law enforcement to execute a sweep of outstanding criminal warrants and to clear people with mental health issues and substance use disorder from the corridor near Melnea Cass Boulevard and Massachusetts Avenue, known as Mass. and Cass.

At City Hall last week, Mayor Michelle Wu unveiled her plan to mitigate worsening conditions at the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard, which has in recent years become an open-air drug market where many struggling with homelessness and addiction have flocked.

As temperatures warm up across the city, city councilors and neighbors alike have raised concerns over increasing violence and growing numbers of homeless living on the streets in the area known as Mass and Cass.

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu announced last week that the city plans to clear encampments in the area surrounding Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard no later than Jan. 12 by connecting people living in tents to appropriate services, including supportive housing that is or will be made available in coming weeks.

As election season moves forward with a pared-down list of candidates, community activists are capitalizing on added attention to the ongoing opioid crisis at “Mass and Cass” by demanding that campaigns have concrete plans in order to secure neighborhood support.

State Rep. Jon Santiago and City councilors Andrea Campbell and Annissa Essaibi George outlined their plans for the area earlier this year, while City Councilor Michelle Wu and acting Mayor Kim Janey have not yet announced specific platforms.

Growing up in the Roxbury and South End neighborhoods, Yahaira Lopez is one of many who has cut through Clifford Park to get to Target and Stop & Shop. Now, she can’t bear to walk through it.