By Mark Herz and Diego Lopez
August 6, 2024
Boston has the nation’s second-highest rate of homelessness among major cities, according to a new report from Boston Indicators. But the report also found that the city has done an exemplary job of providing shelter.
Other demographics demonstrated in the report were that most unhoused people are in family groups, accounting for almost two-thirds of Greater Boston’s homeless population, and that many of those experiencing homelessness are recent immigrants.
The report also found that youth under 18 have the highest homelessness rate of any age group, at more than one-and-a-half-times higher than the second highest group, those aged 25-34. But older people are increasingly in danger in the region as well, said Karen LaFrazia, president of the St. Francis House shelter in Boston.
“There are elderly people that are losing their housing that have been renters their whole life, and now, the rent has gotten beyond their ability to pay, and they find themselves homeless.”
LaFrazia added, “if homelessness is ultimately a housing issue, and if we’re going to, as a city and as a state, make significant investments in the development of affordable housing, then I think we can abate the numbers growing — but that’s what it’s going to take.”
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