Massachusetts
I visited supervised consumption sites in six cities. Here’s what I found. – The Boston Globe
In Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto, Quebec City, and New York, and in Philadelphia where sites are proposed, I spent hours walking the neighborhood streets and alleyways, sitting at bus stops, talking with people, and lingering in parks and doorways.
In Montreal, at dusk on a Saturday night, I sat on a bench across from a storefront site. Clients of all ages arrived by foot, car, and bike, mostly indistinguishable from the patrons standing in line at a restaurant just down the block. A few waiting restaurant patrons walked by, some with children, seemingly unaware of what was behind the door to the site. Those who stopped and read the information displayed in the window casually meandered back to the restaurant line.
A site in downtown Montreal was different. On a side street, it was marked by a nondescript door. People quietly came and went until after midnight. The neighborhood featured a busy commercial road at the end of the street and newer, higher-end housing throughout.
In contrast, the Downtown Eastside neighborhood of Vancouver can only be described as jarring. Hundreds of people were wandering the streets and alleys, with many encamped at the time in a nearby park. Old and worn apartment buildings, rooming houses, and hotels fill the area. There are several nondescript supervised consumption sites in the neighborhood, practically invisible among the busy street life.
In New York, I went to scope out the East Harlem site the day before I was to formally visit, but on my first pass, even with the address, I couldn’t find it. A pastor at a local church told me the site was helping those in need with minimal — if any — negative neighborhood impacts.
In Toronto, people loitering outside a community health center hinted that a site was located inside, but it wasn’t entirely obvious within the context of the whole neighborhood. A staff member said they were looking at alternatives to sharing the health center entrance. A police officer working a detail for a movie filming next door was not sure how he felt about such sites but felt location was key in terms of access and limiting neighborhood impacts. In Quebec City, the new site looked like nothing other than a storefront.
Indistinguishable. Nondescript. Practically invisible. Supervised consumption sites blend with their neighborhoods.
How they look from the street contrasts with how they look inside. In Canada, the rooms appear clinical, almost sterile; in New York, a little less so. All have cubicles with a chair, clean counter, mirror, disinfecting wipes, and a disposal container. Some have rooms for people who inhale drugs, and all have rooms in which clients can relax. They offer clean needles, pipes, and other supplies. Each is staffed with qualified and caring staff, paid and volunteer, ready to respond to an overdose with oxygen or naloxone, a medication used to reverse an opioid overdose.
From what I observed, they treat clients with dignity and respect and develop easy rapports with them, determined by the comfort level of each client. Friendships form, making it easier for clients to access health care and to ask for treatment, something I witnessed in East Harlem.
Viewing the sites and what they do must be put in context. I had heard that some who visited the Vancouver sites on official trips, for instance, were shocked by the neighborhood, concluding that the supervised consumption sites attracted drug users and dealers and were responsible for the jarring conditions.
A police officer with whom I walked the neighborhood after spending a full day there myself said it looked this way long before the sites opened. For years, the officer explained, it was a place where people with untreated mental health conditions ended up after losing jobs and housing. He said he believes untreated mental illness is at the root of the neighborhood’s problems and that while supervised consumption sites are not the full answer, they do save lives.
By walking the streets and visiting the sites, I also learned how these facilities can lessen the strain that drug use puts on local first responders and hospitals. Just off Kensington Street in Philadelphia, within moments of arriving to view an area proposed for a site, I saw fire apparatus and police cars pulling out of a side street. Two firefighters remained to try and help a woman, while the man with her said, “You OD’d girl. You’re purple.”
In contrast, at a Vancouver site a couple of weeks before I visited, 14 overdoses occurred in a single day at one injection site due to a bad batch of drugs in the neighborhood. Nobody died. Some of those 14 people might have died on the streets if not for the site. There might have been several 911 calls, several police, fire, and ambulance responses, and several transports and emergency room stays. Instead, having trained personnel on hand meant each case could be handled swiftly and appropriately, while simultaneously sparing health care and emergency response resources.
Massachusetts has successful needle exchange programs. At a Montreal site, the director referenced how it originally had been a safe materials site, i.e., a needle exchange program. They knew when they provided a client with clean needles and supplies that the client was walking out the door and to a nearby alley or park to inject. Or, as I thought, to the bathroom of a gas station. Instead, she said, why not let them walk through the door into a supervised setting, eliminating the risks of overdose, needle litter, and infection.
The number of overdose deaths in Massachusetts suggests that, however well-intentioned, signs in gas station bathrooms are not enough. Supervised consumption sites can help bring drug use out of bathrooms, alleyways, and parks, and into safe places.
What I saw and learned in Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto, Quebec City, Philadelphia, and New York leads me to believe that Massachusetts should allow any community that chooses to host a supervised consumption site to do so as a pilot program, using the experience and data to better inform Massachusetts policy makers and residents of the role such facilities can play in efforts to combat the drug epidemic. They can save money, and they will save lives.
Senator John F. Keenan represents Norfolk and Plymouth counties in the Massachusetts Legislature.
Massachusetts
Meteor Lands In Cape Cod + Bus Crash Kills 5 From MA + Wind Storm Knocks Out Power To Thousands: MA Weekend
MASSACHUSETTS — Residents throughout New England were simultaneously startled as a meteor that landed in Cape Cod caused a sonic boom this past weekend.
Meanwhile, a bus driver is facing charges after five Massachusetts residents died in a crash on a highway in Virginia.
Plus, another State Trooper was caught handling a wrong-way driver situation on Route 1.
Mysterious Boom Heard Across MA Was An Exploding Meteor, Experts Say
The noises were heard around 2:11 p.m. Saturday, with people describing a sudden bang that rattled windows and even shook some homes. The American Meteor Society said that the booms heard were actually caused by a meteor about three feet wide entering the atmosphere near the border of Massachusetts and New Hampshire.
Residents as far as Ipswich and Johnston, Rhode Island, reported hearing and feeling the sensations. Meteorologist Nick Stewart shared satellite images from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, showing where the meteor entered the atmosphere and combusted while traveling at 75,000 miles per hour above the ocean.
Bus Driver Charged After MA Family Of 4, Worcester Woman Killed In VA Crash
Jing S. Dong, of Staten Island, New York, now faces two counts of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the collision, which occurred around 2:35 a.m. Friday on southbound I-95 near Quantico. Among those killed were a 45-year-old man, a 44-year-old woman, a 13-year-old girl and a 7-year-old boy, all from Greenfield, Massachusetts. All were in the Acura, which police said caught fire after the collisions. Police on Saturday evening identified the fifth person killed as Priscilla R. Mafalda, 25, of Worcester, Massachusetts, who was riding in the Suburban struck by the bus.
In total, about 44 people were transported to area hospitals, including three with critical injuries.
State Trooper Hospitalized After Route 1 Wrong-Way Crash In Peabody
State Police said the trooper was hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries after police acted in coordination to protect traffic and stop the driver, who was traveling southbound on Route 1 North in Peabody. The incident occurred not far from the location on Route 1 where State Trooper Kevin Trainor was killed when his cruiser was hit head-on in a wrong-way crash in Lynnfield last month. The driver in Sunday’s crash was also hospitalized and charged with operating under the influence of liquor, negligent operation of a motor vehicle, and driving the wrong way on a state highway.
Rapidly Expanding Grocery Chain Has Big Plans For MA
Sprouts Farmers Market is slated to launch up to 40 locations throughout the region in the coming years. Construction has begun for the first Massachusetts spot in Weymouth, which has an opening date of 2028. The Phoenix-based organic grocery chain has more than 480 stores in 25 states.
Saturday’s Meteorite Was ‘Fishy Squisher’ And NASA Knows Where To Find It In Cape Cod Bay
Data from NASA suggest fragments of the meteorite lie in waters from the middle of the bay to about 10 miles northeast of the town of Sandwich. The agency said late Saturday it picked up radar signatures of the fragments from four radar sites, and termed the strike a “fishy squisher.” The meteorite entered Earth’s atmosphere about 40 miles above the Bay State and southern New Hampshire, creating the sonic boom. Water in the bombarded portion of Cape Cod Bay is about 100 feet deep.
35K Without Power As Winter-Like Storm Pummels MA With 55+ MPH Winds
Massachusetts residents throughout the North Shore were without power on Saturday morning as a winter-like storm tore a path of tree damage, downpours, and fierce winds throughout New England. Widespread tree damage was reported across the state, with the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency reporting 34,228 customers without power as of 11:20 a.m. Wind speeds reached a high of 55 miles per hour. Temperatures dropped into the 40s with wind chills in the 30s as the storm arrived across the Bay State. The unsettled weather will continue through Monday and Tuesday before a warming trend takes hold later in the week.
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Cape Shoreline Named Among The Nation’s 10 Best, According To ‘Dr. Beach’
U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, a moderate Massachusetts Democrat, secured enough delegate support Saturday to appear on the state’s primary ballot as he challenges incumbent U.S. Sen. Ed Markey in this year’s Senate race.
Yet even though Moulton cleared a key hurdle to continue his Senate bid, it was Markey who won the party’s endorsement after winning more than 50% of the delegation’s support.
“You have a choice, you have to decide what the future looks like and what you’re going to demand,” Markey said Saturday in front of more than 4,000 delegates.
Markey won nearly 73% of the delegates’ support, while Moulton won nearly 27% of the vote. Massachusetts Democratic Party rules require statewide candidates to get at least 15% of delegate support to appear on primary ballots.
In heavily Democratic Massachusetts, the Senate primary contest is one of the most closely watched in the country as Moulton, 47, has centered his campaign on changing the status quo and demanding a generational shift in leadership.
If reelected, Markey would be 80 before his third six-year term would begin. While Markey has touted his stamina and embrace of progressive policies, questions about age have continued to swirl around Democratic candidates as they fight to take back control of Congress.
Incumbent Sen. Ed Markey is leading Rep. Seth Moulton, but if Rep. Ayanna Pressley were to enter the Democratic primary, it would change the picture, according to a new poll from Suffolk University and The Boston Globe.
In his nomination speech, Moulton argued that the Democratic Party needed more than “incremental change” and needed to start anew.
“It’s time for the generation that grew up with the internet, and will have to live for decades with AI, to lead our way through it,” Moulton said.
Moulton only addressed his opponent briefly during his nomination speech, giving a passing nod on not waiting another six years for generational change and later calling on Markey to participate in multiple debates before the September primary. Currently, the two candidates have agreed to participate in one debate later this summer.
Markey, instead, took a more critical approach by attacking Moulton’s previous comments about transgender kids and accepting corporate PAC money.
“Massachusetts deserves better than a senator who scapegoats trans kids,” Markey said to loud cheers.
In 2024, Moulton caught flak from some members of his party for saying he didn’t want his daughters playing in sports against transgender girls. Critics said Moulton echoed Trump’s talking points against allowing transgender athletes in girls’ and women’s sports.
Moulton has since said his intent with that statement “was to point out that, as a party, we need to be willing to have difficult conversations.”
Moulton, who enlisted in the Marines after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and served four tours of duty in Iraq, was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2014. He briefly launched a 2020 presidential campaign, but he dropped that bid after a few months.
Markey served as a Massachusetts congressman for nearly 40 years before winning the Senate seat in 2013. He fended off a challenge in 2020 from Rep. Joe Kennedy III in the Senate primary by turning to his progressive allies to overcome a challenge from a younger rival from America’s most famous political family.
The Massachusetts primary is Sept. 1.
RANDOLPH, Mass. (WWLP) – A Randolph resident has won a $1 million prize through the final drawing of the Massachusetts State Lottery “$4,000,000 Monopoly Doubler” instant ticket game.
Brenda Mellor of Randolph claimed the game’s tenth and final $1 million prize.
She selected the cash option and received a one-time payment of $650,000 before taxes. Mellor said she plans to use the winnings to pay for home improvements, including renovations to her roof and pool.
The winning ticket was purchased at The Variety Store at 2 Mazzeo Drive in Randolph. The retailer will receive a $10,000 bonus for selling the ticket.
Local News Headlines
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