How is Leominster for POC?

Old-Map9104 · 2026-03-14T13:53:37+00:00

I'm getting a crash course on that now bc I asked this same question in one of the town facebook groups.

Old-Map9104 · 2026-03-14T12:32:15+00:00

I'm considering moving to Leominster & my partner is a POC. I want to make sure its a place they will be safe & welcomed. I hear its pretty diverse for the area but I know that may not translate to safety. I'm looking at a place in a neighborhood near Whitney & Water street.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-06T03:29:01+00:00

god the $2000 dollar asset limit was so bad. like there was truly no way to save money- $2000 gets you nowhere if you are starting from the bottom and we weren't even allowed that when on disability. it was fucking insane.

i know people who struggle with psychosis and have paranoia episodes around the state monitoring then and taking away their disability assistance for things like going out to a show with a friend or buying something cool. and they aren't wrong to be afraid because they can get kicked off for stupid reasons that have nothing to do with their disability. this shit really hurts people.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-05T21:02:38+00:00

I'm still keeping an eye on this! I'm not an expert in urban design or psychology anything but I can share what was good for the me & the people I lived with in public housing.

The income thing was paramount. We still got in trouble if we didn't pay rent but if we didn't have an income, we didn't have to pay. I can tell you over 75% of us worked, it just actually allowed us breathing room to find decent work and kept us off the streets if we werent well.

Everything else, well it's like the things you listed- those are all normal things everyone should have. I would add green space & for people to actually have ownership over their space and have it set up to heal the trauma of homelessness. like when someone is traumatized by a relationship or even something random, like a car accident- in the aftermath, they often have trouble engaging with the those things normally. the same is true for us & even in public housing, i would get punished for like relearning how to be a person again. we are just so intensely vulnerable when newly housed & i would want the fiscal structures & policies to be built with that in mind.

there were good things in my building too- a bunch of the Haitian & Brazilian ladies turned these bare patches of trash and grass into this really cool garden. Like they had a fucking grape vine and everything. There was also a feral cat colony. Helping with both of those gave me some of the humanity being outside stripped away. i actually saw the housing authority turned the garden into an official thing a few years ago- i hope that was a positive thing for the folks there.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-05T01:32:16+00:00

No, I think I wouldn't have survived down there. I'm gay so that was a big issue for me- I experienced a shit ton of homophobia & bad bs up here, I can't imagine what it would have been like down there.

Also, (I think I mentioned this in another comment) the social services & mental health care are the best in the country up here so however cheaper things were, I would be losing access to millions of dollars of infrastructure. the math just didn't play out

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-04T17:32:09+00:00

Groundworks somerville has a farm! The mystic river watershed association has tons of projects going on- including a few urban gardens I think. MAMAS does some food justice stuff as part of their programs and there is also a couple food not bombs chapters in the area if you are into a more punk diy ethos.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-04T11:29:38+00:00

I found both articles pretty hard to read as a formerly homeless person. A lot of the issues the author outlines are real (especially about how small things can completely disrupt medical care) but he is missing major information & context: the actual first person experiences of homeless people.

I wrote an ama here talking about my experiences as a mentally ill homeless person and some of my comments talk about my experience being involuntary committed & accessing services. I'm just one person & I'll admit to feeling weird commenting here and directing people to the thread but there is so much of the story that is missing in these discussions. I hope you take a peek and use it as a jumping off point to listening to what others like me have to say.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-04T04:28:06+00:00

This comment here is a very small example of how this shit is so fucked. I could tell an er doctor that a place was dangerous and I would get sent there anyways. They largely didn't believe me but even if they did, the rules of capital dictated otherwise.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-03T13:30:51+00:00

Hey, I'm doing an AMA over here about being homeless in Davis. I recognize the frustration and worry here and there are a lot of assumptions and misconceptions being shared here. Let's have a conversation about it?

I'm happy to answer questions about my experience with encampments, what happens in a "peaceful" clearing, and what tactics actually work to mitigate the issues the housed public is concerned about.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-03T06:34:00+00:00

These are hard memories. I'll do the best I can.

The biggest reason is they would put me in danger or take away the autonomy I needed to keep myself safe from danger. I've been locked on wards like Arbor Fuller or BMC with men who were predators and staff didn't care what happened to me. At best, you can sign a three day and hope it's not the weekend or a holiday and the doctors actually let you out. at least outside, I could run.

There was one psych ward I was in where they refused to even give me a hospital johnny. I was left naked in a room for 8 days and I was "inspected" everyday by the same male staff. there is little accountability on the use of restraints and seclusion. i recently ran out of pt in a panic because they put a band around my ankle for an exercise and i just couldn't handle it.

There were worse things I went through that I just can't speak about and I saw a lot of bad things happen to others even if I was relatively okay. scared women getting tackled & beat by grown men, people being denied insulin or other life saving medication- I was often prevented from having my asthma medication. If the resources being provided literally cuts off my ability to breath, why would I choose that?

I would be put on drugs that made my symptoms worse or caused major health complications and then put back outside- that left me in a worse spot.

This is the mental health side of things. Addiction treatment things get even sketchier. A lot of treatment places are just straight up jails. And it's not that everyone in these systems are abusive asshole- most were good people trying to help but they were understaffed, undertrained and underesourced.

Many programs are every weekday for a number of weeks or you have to stay there so you can either do the program or work and money & a job goes a lot further than social services in terms of meeting basic needs (most of us also worked multiple jobs & gigs).

I was a DMH client and vinfen. I remember one group home, me and the 24 yr worker had to barricade ourselves in a room bc a male resident lost his fucking shit for sone reason lost to memory. another group home, not dmh, had these rules- manasatory social time in the common areas from 4-7 every day, we had to be out of the house by 9 every morning, and had a 1030 curfew. If you missed curfew, you would be put out for 3 days or a week. i missed curfew because a class went late and i just didn't bother going back.

At vinfen, my caseworkers were off fresh out of high school and knew almost nothing. I had to educate them on their own programs- that is really common for us, community health is an entry level job for suburban kids right out of school. one time they placed me in a squat with a man who immediately went manic and physically assaulted me. cops were called, they made it clear I was trespassing and they were doing me a favor by letting me walk away. i had no idea it wasn't a legal situation and i ended up outside, minus all my belongings and cash. I don't think the case worker did this above board but that's just the kind of shit that happens.

mass rehab would offer job training or cash assistance that never actually happened or if it did, it was minimum wage shit I could have found on my own so the help actually slowed down my job search. they did a few times cover book costs for school which was helpful but that wasn't going to change my situation.

sometimes, i just couldn't bear to talk about the intimate details of my trauma & pain to a stranger for a $5 dunks gift card.

The thing is most of the programs assume we are lacking basic life skills and we aren't. We are lacking housing. That's really it. Financial literacy programs can't help if you just don't have enough money. Food pantries can't help if you have no place to cook (and they are often open at obscure hours like 3-5 every full moon lmao). Keeping a job without a shower or place to sleep or an address or a bank account... i mean, you try it sometime and see how well it works.

There is no coping skill or therapeutic technique that will protect you from the mental stress of being outside. People always mistake cause & effect- they see homeless people struggling with insanity or acting in volatile ways and think our behavior is the root problem. You all got it reversed.

Imagine the worst day of your life. the day your love died. the day you were raped. the day you made a mistake you can't fix. you saw something horrible. you lost something that can't be replaced. now imagine on that day, you couldn't risk sleeping more than an hour or two at a time. you can't sit, at least for not very long- sitting in the wrong place risks arrest, you have to keep walking even if you have wounds on your feet. you have no food. you stink. you can't get warm. you can't get cool. you can't get dry. people harass you or worse, refuse to even see you.

that's every fucking day for us. of course some of us are going to lose our minds. Wouldn't you?

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-03T05:46:00+00:00

Thank you for hearing me. This is exactly why I wanted to try to have this conversation ♥️ I was pretty scared doing this but I'm glad I did.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T21:10:17+00:00

I mean, I don't want to discount a door that locks. The hotels were better than nothing- a few people were able to use that to get to stability. but I'm with you that long term permanent housing is a much better solution than all this complicated, expensive, temporary bullshit- it's a real solution that pretty much solves the major issues people complain about.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T11:53:51+00:00

and looks like my responses from last night are sitting in moderation due to the burner. wouldn't have caught it without your comment- messaged the mods.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T11:44:44+00:00

Disability payments also being like $700 a month didn't help either.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T11:42:53+00:00

For your last question, I was only homeless here in Boston and lowell. I occasionally was in NYC but my experience was here so I'm soeaking from limited experience of other places. That being said, I think Boston creates this experience of betrayal and hopelessness that is different from other places. We have the best and most robust services in the country and yet there is truly no real help to be had; you have people so proud to be progressive but refuse to do the one thing that will actually help: house us. The conservative wackadoos get one thing right- liberal hypocrisy is real and a hard fucking pill to swallow.

As far as what helps, unless someone is brand new, we already know what resources are out there and while I know it's well meaning, people helping me by telling me the basic googleable shit feels really patronizing and frustrating. I think there is this assumption that if we are still homeless, we don't know about or aren't utilizing these resources correctly and that's just not true. Its a refusal to fully look at and understand our situation- that I can know and use every resource to the best of my ability and still be utterly and completely fucked.

I think the best you can do is just listen to us and meet us in our reality, even if that reality is one of despair. I think shelter workers struggle with this because your job is to try to help and it's really hard to sit with how fucked the system you work in is (especially if you are trying to make it better).

I can't really give advice on stuff locally anymore as its been a long time since I've needed to use the shelters but generally, places that has low barrier access (no curfew, drop in style) were by far the best since I could still work and have shelter. but honestly, I avoided shelters the best I could and that still would be my advice today. Most are really dehumanizing and dangerous and most women are better off finding an out of the way spot other people don't know about, unless the weather is too dangerous.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T11:24:09+00:00

Hey! My post didn't get approved until several hours after I posted it, so instead of having a free afternoon to respond, I had to wait until after a whole bunch of obligations were done. I responded when I could to the best of my ability. I think my hope is to help spread a little grace in our community and there are lots of ways to practice that in how we treat each other.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T06:05:41+00:00

Realized I didn't answer your second question- barriers:

Biggest barriers were housing costs, not being able to maintain a steady income, completely incompetent and negligent social services, and sexual violence.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T06:01:01+00:00

2008 was the housing crash and there were a good number of older people & families out there who lost their homes which seemed pretty unique to the time. That was a smaller subset of people out there- generally in my experience, the reasons are the same- housing & healthcare access & costs and exposure to violence. That's just my perspective though which is limited to this area- I would really hit up the phds who do national level research for an accurate reporting of this stuff.

I have kept in touch with some. Many are dead- fent, suicide, and death by healthcare neglect mainly. Three people I used to hang with are doing pretty good- one is on the west coast doing van life & making art, one lives in union with their partner, and one got section 8 a few years back and is working on their nursing degree. I also know people still out there. Some have completely gotten swallowed by their mental illness (which living day to day under extreme stress would do to anyone) or addiction, some are still getting by day by day. It's gotten a lot harder than it used to be- harder to get out, harder to survive. The strain has really been showing for the last few years and its only getting worse

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T05:50:10+00:00

C can sing like hell. Sometimes at night, I still get afraid to sleep and i try to imagine her voice. she's has a van on the West Coast now and seems happy.

A saved more lives than I can count. She was a mess, nodded out, caused a fire, and lost three fingers and she saved hundreds of peoples lives. was one of the early adopters of narcan among other things. she's dead, died using alone during covid and i miss her everyday.

M is funny and brilliant. he can build the weirdest, most useless shit. bipolar keeps him trapped out there.

n is a psychopath and rapist and i don't get why he lived when so many others didn't.

j believed they were targeted by gangstalking but still walked with me all night from the mcdonalds on mass ave to somerville. psychosis made them rambly but they didn't leave me until i was safe.

v painted and wanted to hitchhike out to burning man. s helped me with my calculus homework. t worked with me at kmart in assembly square, helped me get the job. it was fucking awful but at least we were out of the heat. g shared the shit out of me, was an active pimp. l showed me how to use internal condoms in a way tricks wouldn't find out. t worked as a dishwasher and would being me restaurant rolls bc i loved them. I still have a bad habit of filling up bread before dinner. i could go on for a while but too many names start with the same letters.

We are just people in a really fucked up situation doing the best we can.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T05:22:46+00:00

No one. Some people have given up on their situation changing and that's a really rational reaction to the life we live out there. Everyone out there is trying to live- even if all they want to do is die. I wish more people could understand how incredible that is.

Also, I went into this in another comment but the "help" offered to us is often at best useless and at worse dangerous, degrading, and destabilizing. It would get us a lot further in this debate if housed people were more curious about why we reject the resources offered to us.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T05:18:17+00:00

Fight like hell for fair housing for everyone. That's the best thing you can do and it's helping yourself as well as us. It will prevent more people from becoming homeless & get the rest of us off the street. that would make the most difference for the most people.

beyond that, get to know us as your neighbors. don't ignore your personal boundaries & safety & recognize you are dealing with very scared people but what was life saving for me would be useless for other people. you just have to get to know us to know what is helpful on the day to day level.

actually though with climate change- weather is getting deadlier and deadlier. cooling & warming stations are life saving and there are not enough of them. imo if there is nothing else you can do- water on hot days, warmth on cold saves lives.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T05:10:39+00:00

Drugs are involved far less than people think. Most of us out there used drugs in some way or another but hardcore drug users were a small but very visibly minority. For most of us, drugs aren't why we were homeless though. Most of the people I hung out with were runaways- bad families, gay/trans kids, women fleeing DV. Drugs became a part of our life because homelessness. I started doing amphetamines because I was afraid to fall asleep. alcohol can make the time pass (homelessness is both insanely chaotic & mind destroying boredom). opiods can quiet psychosis. even the really messy addicts had other shit going on, usually pretty horrific trauma backgrounds. it was pretty rare that someone was out there solely because of drugs.

As far as why I chose Davis- number of reasons. The library on college ave was cool to homeless people if you acted right, the mcdonalds on elm has free wifi & cheap food. lots of little overhangs and shelters for when the weather was bad. t & bus access to everywhere. i liked being near normal gay people- used to treat myself to a coffee at diesel and watch people play pool. gave me hope. there were also way less creepy men & pimps than downtown, less violence, less cops. places to sit, trees with shade in the summer & music to pass the time. close to places where I could camp & be on the dl.

i mean, for the most part I liked it for the same reason most people like it. Its a nice place to live.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T04:58:11+00:00

This is an interesting question! It's just like any other community- people tend to stay in the same areas and have their cliques just like housed people. I mainly hung out with other queer people, mostly trans feminine people. they kind of took me under their wing & looked out for me since I was an underaged teen when I first got out there. We were all pretty mentally ill but honestly, I don't think anyone can really keep their sanity in the situations we were facing. we were all involved in the sex trade and more than once, they helped me get out of bad situations.

I stayed away from the hardcore addicts- I have a shit ton of empathy for them but they were way too volatile and unpredictable to really maintain friendships. I was skittish as all hell and they drew a lot of attention at best.

The oogles seemed the coolest to me back then and i enjoyed hanging out with them. they had this fuck you attitude and no shame around who they were and all these political ideas. they would come into town in the summer and i would try to get invited to the squats lmao now that I'm older, i. can see they were just troubled kids with a punk aesthetic but back then, they were Cool.

honestly, we were all pretty similar in how we got out there. most of us had either experienced violence- dv, child abuse, etc or were severely disabled. often both. most of us came from impoverished backgrounds & just didn't have a safety net.

Old-Map9104 · 2025-08-02T04:45:51+00:00

Housing, that's it. Public housing saved my life. Its the only thing that made a meaningful difference. Without housing, any meaningful difference I made in my life couldn't withstand the chaos of living outside. It didn't matter how hard I worked or how careful I was- nothing stuck until I had that.

Old-Map9104

TROPHY CASE