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Home, 2 jobs make this Veterans Day extra-special Local agencies help Army veteran's 'dream come true'
By Brad Kane, The Patriot Ledger, November 11, 2009
PLYMOUTH - Army veteran Keiron Greenwood moved his family from Texas to Massachusetts in August, hoping to find a better life. After three months in which they wound up homeless, jobless and in desperate need of help, the family of five is enjoying a storybook ending. Today, the Greenwoods move into their new home in Plymouth, and Keiron is starting his two jobs.
"This is by far the biggest Veterans Day I have ever had," Greenwood said. "It has been a dream come true."
Thanks to Father Bill's & MainSpring and Quincy Veterans Services, the 10-year U.S. Army veteran feels like he's on solid footing for the first time in years. Read more.
By Bella English, Globe Columnist | July 26, 2009
Most people don't have buildings or bridges or parks named after them, until they die. The Rev. William McCarthy, known around the South Shore simply as Father Bill, had a building named after him years ago, long before he developed health problems that led to his death Thursday night at age 82.
Father Bill's Place in Quincy is very much like its namesake: a simple building with a big heart. It opened its doors 20 years ago; before that, McCarthy had let homeless folks stay in the basement of St. John's School; he was pastor at the church. Neighbors began to complain, so the priest began looking for another space. He found one near the animal shelter on a dead-end road - no neighbors to complain. Read more
REV. WILLIAM MCCARTHY; BUILT NETWORK OF SUPPORT FOR HOMELESS ON SOUTH SHORE
By Emma Stickgold, The Boston Globe | July 27, 2009
As he noticed more people coming to his church's doorstep in the late 1970s and early 1980s needing a place to stay, the Rev. William McCarthy, better known as Father Bill, made a few phone calls.
Within a few weeks, one of the area's first shelters was created.
Aptly named Father Bill's Place, it was the start of a network that would eventually serve homeless veterans, battered women, and teens tossed from their homes. As this network took root throughout the South Shore, the longtime pastor of St. John the Baptist in Quincy took heat for bringing in a population that was less than popular in some areas. Just as he persuaded hesitant abutters that 'love your neighbor'' was more powerful than any not-in-my-backyard sentiments, he had a way with potential donors that led them to hand over thousands of dollars to cover the costs of keeping his various projects running.
"Very few people say no to me,'' he told the Globe in 2007. But he also did not say "No,'' to anyone, reaching into his pockets to help families buy sheets or fix a boiler.
A parishioner once asked him why he never wore her late father's cashmere coat that she gave him. He explained that he had given it away. "Someone came to the rectory door and needed it and I didn't.''
From the beginning, the idea was to create housing - not shelters - that provided a more permanent solution, to help people find work, and to take in people who were suffering from drug addition and alcohol abuse, even after similar facilities turned them away. Continue reading.
FOR HOMELESS AGENCY, THE FOCUS IS ON PERMANENCE
By Bella English, The Boston Globe| October 19, 2008
For the past five years, Father Bills Place in Quincy has sheltered fewer and fewer homeless people, with the goal shifting to permanent, not emergency, housing. Just over a year ago, it merged with MainSpring in Brockton to create a super-agency dealing with the South Shore's homeless. The president, John Yazwinski, was elated. Father Bills had been ahead of the curve in its Housing First program, which provides the homeless with homes, not just a bed for the night. With the merger, more units can be funded. As one agency, Father Bills & MainSpring offers emergency shelter for singles and families, along with transitional and permanent housing. There are special units for veterans, victims of domestic violence, and teens in trouble.
Read more here
HOMELESSNESS HITS RECORD HIGH
Advocates expect numbers to grow amid economic downturn and ask for state aid
By Connie Paige, Globe Correspondent, October 6, 2008
Despite a pledge by Governor Deval Patrick to end homelessness, the number of homeless people in the state is at a record high and likely to rise because of the mortgage crisis and continuing surge in foreclosures.
With homeless shelters filled to capacity, more than 500 families across the Commonwealth are being put up in hotels and motels - a drastic increase from last year at this time, when 27 were housed in motels.
Advocates are asking the state to come up with emergency financial assistance to help the expected spike of additional homeless people make it through the winter.
"We don't want to turn people away in the winter, and we don't want to have people die outside," said John Yazwinski, executive director of Father Bills & MainSpring, a nonprofit organization that provides shelter for the homeless and affordable housing on the South Shore. "We're afraid we may not have the capacity to get everybody indoors."
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NOT JUST SHELTER, BUT HOME, FOR THE HOMELESS
By Bella English, The Boston Globe, March 23, 2008
The homeless veteran, suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, had been living in a tent behind a plaza in Plymouth for nearly a decade.
A woman struggling with serious mental health issues had been homeless for three years, in and out of shelters on the South Shore.
Thanks to the Housing First program started three years ago by Father Bill's Place, an emergency shelter in Quincy, the man and the woman - and many more like them - are now in their own apartments or lodging house rooms. For many, it is the first home they've had in years.
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SHELTER CARE
Hope Wilson, RN, finds caring for the homeless a rewarding experience
By Sarah Long
It was just another day at the office for Hope Wilson, RN, when officers from the Braintree Department of Public Health gave her GPS coordinates to find the man holed up deep in the woods and in need of medical attention.
Having worked at Father Bill's emergency shelter in Quincy, MA, for nearly 15 years, Wilson has become a familiar and trusted face to the homeless patients she treats. She visits them in the clinic, on the streets and, recently for the first time, in the woods.
"That's unusual for any homeless person to be deep in the woods. They're usually very close to the street, not far from people and activity," Wilson said. "I've found that if someone is deep in the woods, it's because they're very mentally ill and very paranoid, and that was the case."
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CLEAN SLATE
For a work crew of homeless people from Brockton, antigraffiti effort is a chance to boost pride and skills
By Milton J. Valencia, The Boston Globe, May 8, 2008
BROCKTON - Freddy Calderon really didn't have much of a choice about how he spent the day, but he didn't mind. His assigned task - remove a year's worth of graffiti from the outside wall of the Shivam Variety convenience store - had its own rewards.
"The way I see it, I'm doing my part," said Calderon, whose 37 years have brought him from selling crack on the street, to jail, to the convenience store with a bucket of fresh paint.
"When you see it with all the graffiti off, you feel good inside, because you know you've done something."
Calderon, who is homeless, was doing something not just for the neighborhood, but for himself.
He is one of more than 20 homeless people from Brockton participating in a Work Express program that, at the moment, is taking aim at the city's graffiti taggers. In the process, Calderon and his co-workers are gaining valuable skills and community pride.
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IN FROM THE COLD
Vet no longer homeless, thanks to consolidation of Father Bill's and Mainspring
By Lane Lambert, The Patriot Ledger, September 27, 2007
PLYMOUTH - Back in the spring, home for Dan Champoux was a tent set up in a clearing off Route 3A behind Benny's Plaza in Plymouth. He had lived in hidden spots like that for more than a decade, spending nights in church shelters when it got too cold or snowy.
Now, the 55-year-old Army veteran and onetime roofer lives in a neat, sparsely-furnished basement apartment that he calls "my Taj Mahal."
Champoux is among the first beneficiaries of the merger of Father Bill's Place in Quincy and MainSpring Coalition for the Homeless in Brockton, the two largest agencies serving the homeless in southeastern Massachusetts.
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MERGER STRENGTHENS HOMELESS VOICE
Merger to benefit South Shore's homeless population
By Emily Johnson, Spare Change News , November 7, 2007
Despite the hundreds of services throughout Massachusetts that provide shelter, food, clothing, and job training to the homeless, homelessness undoubtedly persists in our state. One might think by working together, some of these organizations could strengthen the fight against homelessness. Last month, two of Mass.'s major homeless service providers decided to do just that, proving the power of cooperation.
"With this new regional model we can hopefully keep people in the communities that their family and friends and supports are," said John Yazwinski, President and CEO of Father Bills & MainSpring.
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FATHER BILL'S MERGER WIDENS FIGHT AGAINST HOMELESSNESS
The Quincy Sun, October 10, 2007
What began 23 years ago as an emergency shelter in the basement of St. John's School in Quincy is spreading its wings to offer aid and comfort to the homeless all over southeastern Massachuesetts.
Father Bill's Place, now a beacon of hope for the homeless in Quincy, last week announced its merger with MainSpring Coalition for the Homeless of Brockton into the newly formed Father Bills & MainSpring.
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SHELTER CLOSED PERMANENTLY
By Matt Carroll, The Boston Globe, September 30, 2007
When something closes down, it's often not good news, but that's not the case in Quincy. A homeless shelter, which has been closed for the past two years, will now be closed permanently. The former shelter at St. John's Parish in Quincy Center has been run by Father Bill's Place and has been funded by Father Bill's, the city, the Quincy Leadership Council on Chronic Homelessness, and the federal government, said Sean Glennon, an assistant city planner. The shelter had been used for "overflow" and for women. Glennon credited the closing to the city's 10-year plan to end homelessness, which was adopted in June 2005.
TWO KEY HOMELESS GROUPS MERGE
Father Bill's joins with MainSpring
By Erin Conroy, Globe Correspondent | September 27, 2007
The region's two largest coalitions for the homeless are merging into a single organization that will expand Quincy's nationally recognized housing initiative to communities as far away as Middleborough and Plymouth.
Father Bill's Place in Quincy and MainSpring Coalition for the Homeless in Brockton, both founded two decades ago, made their announcement today, effective immediately. They say the combined resources of the new organization - called Father Bills & MainSpring - will better advocate for state and federal funding.
The guiding philosophy will be to shift from emergency shelter to permanent housing, with the eventual goal of eliminating homelessness altogether.
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