OWNERSHIP
CONDITIONS
CONTEXT
SOCIAL ISSUES

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OWNERSHIP:
Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program

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CONDITIONS:
The Barbara McInnis House is a freestanding 75-bed recuperative care facility for homeless people. It provides an alternative to far more expensive inpatient care. There is an aboveground parking lot adjacent to the facility.

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CONTEXT:
The Barbara McInnis House is across the street from Franklin Park and the "El Parquecito de la Hermanidad" playground. The patients at Barbara McInnis House do not typically go into Franklin Park unless a volunteer takes them to the zoo on the day that it is free to visit.

In recent years, children from the immediate neighborhood in the School Street area began playing in the McInnis House parking lot. The administration was concerned and talked to the youth about it. They said their parents did not allow them to go into Franklin Park because they believed it to be dangerous. Other neighbors were worried about youth gang activity and refused to have the children gather in the parking lot.

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SOCIAL ISSUES:
The facility has been at this site for eight years and staff members perceive the area to have become safer over time, particularly from 1999 to 2002. Security is very good at the facility, with floodlights and round-the-clock guards. Before 1999, however, there was sometimes gunfire in the immediate vicinity and bullets were shot into the facility.

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