The warmer weather has drawn the crowds back to the city’s open-air drug market at Mass and Cass, which one city councilor says is alarming the community despite the mayor’s insistence that the area is much safer since last year’s tent crackdown.

City Councilor Ed Flynn said roughly 70–80 people have been gathering and openly using and selling drugs at Massachusetts Avenue and Melnea Cass Boulevard on a daily basis for at least the past month.

Flynn said he visited the area on Thursday and observed an “organized system of drug dealers on Melnea Cass” in Roxbury. He described the situation as a danger to people in the area, saying that he went on to speak with residents in South Boston, which is part of his district, who are “very concerned about the significant escalation of drug dealing and drug use in the neighborhoods.”

“I talked to several Boston police officials today and expressed my concern about the area and requested enhanced police presence in the impacted neighborhoods and to arrest drug dealers,” Flynn told the Herald Thursday. “It’s a significant issue impacting the quality of life of residents.”

The criminal activity has also spilled over into other areas, Flynn said, with more people gathering throughout neighborhoods in Roxbury and the South End, Andrew Square in South Boston, and at the South Bay mall in Dorchester.

The South Bay mall drew attention last summer for juvenile mobs committing violent crime, leading then-Councilor Frank Baker to partly blame the example set for youth by the Mass and Cass inhabitants who go through the stores there to “rob the place blind and shoot up drugs in the sidewalks,” when the matter came before the City Council for discussion last September.

Flynn said that not only are businesses at the South Bay mall concerned about the crowds returning at and around Mass and Cass, but those located in the Newmarket business district are as well.

He said people are drawn to the Mass and Cass area because public drug use and dealing has long been “tolerated” there by the city, but emphasized that should not be the case, and is calling for city officials to “revisit and redouble our efforts” that began with last fall’s crackdown on tent encampments and crime.

“I don’t believe we should allow people to use drugs openly on the streets of Boston,” Flynn said. “I believe it’s a public health crisis.”

Mayor Michelle Wu implemented a three-pronged plan to address crime and homelessness in the area last fall, following City Council approval of an anti-encampment ordinance that empowered police to remove the tents that officials said were shielding crime, sex trafficking and weapons.

On a Wednesday appearance on a “Java with Jimmy” podcast, Wu was asked about the uptick in gathering that’s been occurring at Mass and Cass, and how the city planned to address it.

The mayor spoke to the importance of the ordinance, saying that not having the tents there permanently has put the city in a “different and better, safer position than we were a year ago this time.” Last summer, more than 200 people a day were flocking to the area.

The Herald requested an interview with the mayor on Thursday afternoon, but her office declined to make Wu available nor provide a statement, saying in a Friday evening email that it deferred to her comments on “Java with Jimmy.”

Wu’s office did provide statistics shedding more light on her remarks around enhanced safety in the Mass and Cass zone.

The year-over-year data compared Jan. 1 to April 8 of 2023 to the same time period in 2024, showing that robberies were down 40%, aggravated assault was down 14%, residential burglary was down 78%, motor vehicle theft was down 38%, total crime was down 22%, and violent crimes overall were “significantly down.”

What remains to be seen, however, is data capturing the warmer months that have already resulted in larger crowds in the area.

On her podcast appearance, Wu spoke to the city’s efforts to connect longtime inhabitants of Mass and Cass with shelter, housing, drug treatment and services.

She also mentioned the city’s long-term goal of rebuilding a bridge out to a future addiction-recovery campus on Long Island, which has faced staunch opposition from the mayor on the other side of that bridge, Quincy’s Thomas Koch.

While the mayor says the situation at Mass and Cass has improved, she said this year has brought new challenges, particularly the influx of migrants straining the city’s adult shelter system.

City Councilor Henry Santana, who chairs the body’s Public Safety and Criminal Justice committee, said the new challenges there will require new solutions.

“This has always been an issue of intersecting and evolving crises — housing, opioid addiction and mental health — and now, the increasing influx of migrants,” Santana said in a Thursday statement.

“Many of the issues of a year ago have improved with actions taken by the city,” he said, “and the people and some of the issues that we’re seeing today are different, and require new solutions in partnership with the state, particularly to address the strains on the state shelter system and resources for mental health.”

The Boston Red Sox lost to the New York Yankees 8-1 on Friday night at Fenway Park. The loss dropped the Red Sox to 35-35 on the year through 70 games. The Yankees became the first team in baseball to reach 50 wins with the victory.

In the loss, Red Sox’ outfielder Jarren Duran continued to make an impact, going 1-for-3 with two walks. He’s hitting .273 for the year with an OPS of .809 and he’s angling to make his first career All-Star Game as well.

Friday night’s stats just added onto the historic start to his season, as he’s done something not done since the days of Shoeless Joe Jackson and Ty Cobb.

Per @OptaSTATS on social media before the game on Friday:

Jarren Duran has 20 doubles, 10 triples and 15 stolen bases through the @RedSox first 69 games in 2024.

The only other LHB in the modern era to reach each of those marks in fewer than 70 team games in a season are Ty Cobb (1911 & 1917) and Shoeless Joe Jackson (1912).

Duran’s breakout this year is a continuation of what he did for most of the year last year as well. After hitting .295 in 102 games last year, Duran has put together this season despite several injuries in the lineup around him. Triston Casas is on the 60-day IL, Masataka Yoshida and Tyler O’Neill have both been on the IL and Trevor Story is out for the season.

Duran made his major league debut in 2021 and is in his fourth major league season. The Red Sox and Yankees play again on Saturday at 7:15 p.m. ET.

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It’s not that coach Joe Mazzulla planned for this type of effort and performance, but it happened. The Mavericks were the more desperate team. Rookie center Dereck Lively hit his first career 3-pointer during an early Dallas run. Derrick White countered with an airball on a 3.

Nobody played well. The Celtics were punished on the boards. They couldn’t hit threes and they couldn’t hit twos. Now they return to Boston with a 3-1 edge in the series, but perhaps not the psychological edge because the Mavericks finally saw its bench produce while the duo of Kyrie Irving and Luka Doncic shredded a Boston defense that just wasn’t interested in guarding.

Both were able to drive to the basket with ease for layups and floaters. The Celtics perhaps believed the Mavericks were done, that they would lay down after trailing, 3-0, and on the brink of getting swept. Instead it was the Celtics who relented, reverting to their style of “playing with their food.”

The Celtics trailed by as many as 48 points in the third quarter, completely letting go of the rope and forcing Mazzulla to pull his starters with three-plus minutes left in the quarter. They needed to be benched. They were awful. Jayson Tatum missed layups or was stripped at the rim. Jaylen Brown looked two steps slow. Jrue Holiday missed a handful of layups.

White airballed another 3-pointer in the second half. And the Celtics faithful who traveled from Boston, snapped up the tickets on the secondary market and wanted to see history, actually witnessed one of the worst playoff losses in Celtics history. Only two previous Celtics teams lost by more points in the postseason.

What this loss does is create that slight doubt, that slight anxiety that maybe the Celtics have been figured out. The Mavericks played stifling defense in the fourth quarter of Game 3 but the Celtics made enough key buckets to hold on. On Friday, the Celtics couldn’t score in the paint and couldn’t hit even open threes.

Mazzulla was more complimentary of the Mavericks than critical of his own team, but he did think Dallas played harder. How in the world could the Celtics allow the Mavericks to play harder with so much on the line? Nobody had that answer.

“I mean, I don’t know, always in situations like this, it always goes back to us,” Mazzulla said. “But you have to give Dallas credit. They played well. They played really, really well. And that’s the reason why they’re in this, is because when they play like that. So I thought they just outplayed us. I don’t know. I thought Dallas played really [hard] — , because you have to give them credit. It’s not about us. It’s about our opponent and having respect for them.

“And you have to give them credit for how well they played, and that’s the most important thing. So it’s less about us and more about how they played. They played well. They played hard. We have to be more disciplined in how we defend and attack them.”

Adjustments will be necessary.

Mazzulla and his staff have two days to cool down Irving, make things tougher on Doncic, and limit the bench players who are now brimming with confidence.

The Celtics could have played one of their better games and still lost with the way Dallas performed, but they didn’t have a chance to find out because they didn’t offer their best.

Sweeps in the NBA Finals are extremely difficult. The last time an Eastern Conference team swept an NBA Finals series was 1989.

It’s not that the Celtics lost Game 4, it’s how they lost that is a concern. The Celtics still have the advantage. No team has come back from 0-3 and Boston is the better team, but they were so listless in Game 4 that they lost a considerable amount of momentum gained from such an impressive playoff run and winning the first three games of this series.

They’ll have to work hard to regain that and can’t just depend on being home to take this series.

“We learn from it. We take it. We don’t dismiss it,” guard Jaylen Brown said. “We’re going to learn from it. We’re going to see how and why, exactly where the game was won and lost. And then we take those experiences and then we come out and we play like our life depends on it. Because it does.”

The Larry O’Brien Trophy will be shipped to Boston for Game 5, and the Celtics have the precious opportunity to clinch in front of a title-hungry city. They’ll have to play with the ultimate passion, no arrogance and with all the sense of urgency.

Gary Washburn is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at gary.washburn@globe.com. Follow him @GwashburnGlobe.