HomeMy WebLinkAbout2006-03-01-HSC-rpt-Services for Disconnected Lexington Residents SERVICES FOR DISCONNECTED LEXINGTON RESIDENTS
The Lexington Human Services Committee
William L. Blout
Matthew S. Cohen
Norman S. Cohen, Selectman Liaison
Robert A. Dentler, Committee Chair
Sarah B. Conklin
Pamela Joshi
Kelly Magee, Social Services Coordinator
Ellen McDonald
Lauren McSweeney, Director, Department of Social Services
Herbert L. Wasserman
March, 2006
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SERVICES FOR DISCONNECTED LEXINGTON RESIDENTS
In the fall of 2004, Michael Novack, then Lexington Coordinator of Social Services,
suggested to members of the Lexington Human Services Committee that it might develop a
report on the nature and utilization of services to Lexington residents. Committee member Bill
Blout suggested that we concentrate on services and unmet needs of"disconnected persons and
households," defining this group as consisting of those who cannot meet their needs from their
own resources and who lack a network of family or friends who might contribute help
significantly and informally.
Michael Novack provided the Committee with a roster of the service agencies he
worked with and the Committee developed a set of questions and divided the task of
interviewing agency officials among its members. The first half of the project was devoted
to learning about the services provided by agencies within the town of Lexington, and the
second half was given to learning about the services located in surrounding communities
where Lexington residents were referred for help or sought it on their own.
The overall aim of the project was to identify the kinds and adequacy of the services
available to disconnected persons and households who live in Lexington, in order to inform the
Board of Selectmen and to recommend ways to strengthen the overall system.
The first section of the report describes services and operations carried out by
in-town agencies, beginning with the Lexington Department of Social Services itself. The
second section reports on services located in neighboring communities that are utilized by
Lexington residents. And the third section summarizes what we have learned and makes
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recommendations for improving the system to the Board of Selectmen and the School
Committee.
SECTION I. LEXINGTON BASED SERVICES
1). Department of Social Services. The Social Services Department is often the first
social services agency that is contacted by Lexington residents and/or family members about
assisting an individual in need. Referrals are made from school systems, police and fire
departments, local agencies (ex. Minuteman Senior Services), other Town departments, local
religious organizations, family members and friends, and self-referrals. As disconnected persons
often use the Battle Green Inn in Lexington for temporary housing, many referrals from
disconnected persons which originated outside of Lexington will contact the department for
assistance.
Assistance with basic needs include financial assistance (towards rent/housing, food,
utility costs, and transportation), housing/shelter(connecting with Bristol Lodge, other shelters),
fuel and utility assistance, assistance with Food Stamp applications and letters to access the
Lexington Food Pantry, assistance with clothing and household goods (including durable
medical equipment). We also assist individuals around other needs; including referrals to legal
services, childcare, mental health services, nursing services, home care needs (such as home
health/homemaking), and leaf-raking/snow removal services.
For inquiries regarding financial assistance, the Town has two funds available. The
Human Services Fund offer financial assistance up to $1,000; larger requests for financial
support are presented for assistance through the Fund for Lexington board. These funds are
available to Lexington residents, who meet with a social worker to both complete an application
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for financial assistance and review eligibility for other private, state and/or federally funded
programs. Human Services Fund requests are presented to the Director of Social Services for
approval; requests for the Fund for Lexington are presented (anonymously)by a social worker to
the Fund for Lexington board. Other financial assistance resources available within Lexington
include the Lexington Interfaith Clergy Association and the St. Vincent de Paul organization,
either with direct financial help or the use of vouchers for groceries, lodging, transportation,
shelter, and prescriptions costs. Such assistance is typically provided on a one-time, emergency
basis.
For assistance with food, the Lexington Food Pantry is available every Saturday for
Lexington residents (open every other week for non-Lexington residents). Residents are also
able to access food pantries in other local communities, as well as access community meals.
There is no community meal site offered within the Town of Lexington. During the holiday
season, local churches and other organizations (i.e. Lions Club, Rotary, Masons) offer assistance
around holiday meals. Referrals to such programs are coordinated through the Lexington Social
Services Department.
For housing issues, many displaced persons will seek temporary shelter at the Battle
Green Inn. There are no shelters for men, women, or families within Lexington, thus persons
seeking such lodging are typically referred to local communities, including Waltham,
Somerville, and Cambridge. The Lexington Housing Authority offers housing subsidies and
vouchers for qualified individuals, and the Lexington Housing Assistance Board also offers
housing.
There are no community health or mental health centers within Lexington offering free
care. For health issues, residents are referred to the Joseph M. Smith clinic in Waltham. For
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mental health needs, residents are referred to the Edinburg Center in Waltham for crisis
stabilization, and sliding scale fee therapeutic services (though time-limited). Local hospitals are
also available for crisis intervention and ongoing supportive services through their psychiatry
departments.
Over the past year, approximately 8 individuals and families have approached the Social
Services department seeking assistance with emergency shelter and housing. Approximately 40
individuals during the past year sought Fuel Assistance, excluding those Lexington residents
who were previous recipients through this program. Since December 2004, 12 Lexington
residents were provided with emergency financial assistance for various needs, including
overdue rent and utilities, outstanding medical bills, and septic cleaning. Please refer to the
report from the Lexington Food pantry regarding number of referrals over the past year.
The numbers are rising, due largely in part to cutbacks in social programs and the
increases in cost of living (particularly regarding property tax rates). Also, the number of
applicants for programs such as Fuel Assistance is on the rise given the increased heating costs.
Most of our referrals are Lexington residents. Predominantly, those disconnected
individuals and families who come to us are not Lexington residents, but are seeking temporary
shelter at Battle Green Inn or are looking to relocate to this area.
The Social Services Department receives intake via phone or in person, and typically it
will schedule a one-on-one visit to discuss the individual's situation and have the client identify
his or her need. From there, referrals to appropriate agencies to assist are made either in
conjunction with the client or on their behalf. For requests seeking financial assistance, an
application is completed and supporting documentation is collected to validate the need for
financial assistance. Requests are then presented to either the Director of Social Services or the
Fund for Lexington Board. Continued support and advocacy is provided to clients as
appropriate.
In an effort to reach those in need who do not ask for assistance, our goal is to inform
them of the social services provided through the Town through various outreach efforts
regarding the services we offer. This includes collaborating with other Town departments (fire,
police, schools, health, etc.), providing programming (including psycho-educational groups,
etc.), participating in various community groups/boards, and working with various social service
organizations.
The Social Services department collaborates regularly with various Town departments,
including school personnel, fire and police departments, the Health Department, and other town
officials as appropriate. As needed, there is also coordination with members of the local Clergy
Association regarding emergent needs, such as vouchers for food, shelter, prescriptions, and
transportation.
2) Lexington Food Pantry. Residents visit the Food Pantry for access to free food and,
incidentally, for socializing with the volunteers and one another. The Pantry is well supported by
the local community—by churches, food drives involving corporations and schools, and
individual contributors. It is eligible to obtain food from the Boston Food Pantry, a large
regional umbrella agency and warehouse, but in its fourteen years of operation, it has never
needed to ask that agency for food supplies.
The Pantry spends between $28,000 and $30,000 a year on food staples, in addition to
stocking and dispensing donated food. Donations of food have remained steady and ample in
recent years, but monetary donations used to buy staples have run below average in the last two
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years. An article about the Pantry in the Lexington Minuteman in 2005 did not result in a flood
of new dollar donations, as similar articles had done in past years.
The Pantry serves from 55 to 70 households each week. Many of the recipients are long-
term Food Pantry users, most of them elderly. The recipients include mentally ill persons and
single parents. The number of households seeking help rose in 2004 and 2005.
About 75% of the recipients are residents of Lexington. Others come in from adjacent
towns, many of them in order to avoid being seen by friends and neighbors. Lexington residents
in turn use pantries in Waltham and Bedford for similar reasons. The Pantry is open once a week
for residents of Lexington and every other week for out-of-towners. Both groups are required to
present a letter from a social services agency or a clergyman attesting to their need for free food,
and to state the number of persons in their household. Who is served and frequencies of use are
not shared or compared with other agencies in the region. The goal is to operate in a free-
standing way and to provide supplementary food, not complete meals daily.
3) Lexington Housing Assistance Board (LAHB). People in need are referred to
LAHB by town office staff, staff at the Department of Social Services lodged in the Senior
Center, and staff of the Lexington Housing Authority. It develops and provides affordable
housing in a total of 50 units in town. Tenants must be re-approved each year after their initial
acceptance into the program, under federal, state, and local regulations. Tenants may stay a
maximum of five years; in theory, they will succeed in finding other housing within those years.
LAHB serves both Lexington residents and other households in need. Residents are given
preference during the selection process. Many of them are single mothers who are going through
a divorce or coping with abandonment. When an applicant makes a phone call, LAHB mails her
an application form. When it is received, it is reviewed by the director and then filed. When
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a unit becomes available, the applicant is interviewed by two LAHB board members, the full
board reviews the resulting data, implements a credit check and sets a rental rate. The resulting
tenant signs a one year lease and pays a rent and security deposit.
LHAB advertises through the town email list to schools and Metco. Ads are also placed
in the Bay State Banner, El Mundo, other newspapers, and the Hanscom Bulletin. According to
The director, Lexington needs more housing availability, particularly more one and three
bedroom units. Town officials and LHAB board members need to encourage new housing
developers to include affordable housing stock in their projects.
4) Lexington Housing Authority (LHA). This agency provides public housing and
federally funded Section 8 vouchers to low income residents of Lexington and adjacent towns.
Lexington residents are given preferences. LHA deals solely with housing issues, but people
often call or come in to request help with other things, including house cleaning, meals, help in
getting to medical appointments, and the payment of bills. These requests are referred most often
to the Council on Aging.
LHA manages 330 housing units. Because there is a waiting list and very low turnover,
they cannot help everyone who needs help with housing. The waiting list at the close of 2004
included 66 individuals and couples seeking state-based elderly housing assistance, 54 federal
elderly housing seekers, 32 federal family assistance seekers, and 12 applicants for state rental
vouchers, a list that was nearly half as large as the total number of already occupied units. Out of
the 177 people who applied for public housing in 2004, LHA was able to house 34 houesholds in
units that turned over. In the same year, 68 obtained Section 8 application forms. There were
also about 100 residents on the Section 8 waiting list during the year. The waiting list for the
surrounding region was 37,000 families. LHA was able to secure four new vouchers for the year.
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Most people helped by LHA are Lexington residents. Town employees receive
preferences for public housing. Most of the persons in public housing are senior citizens who are
retired and living alone. Most of the housing units among the 330 are one bedroom units.
LHA staff meet monthly with other staff from such towns as Woburn, Winchester,
Newburyport, Somerville, and the North Shore. These meetings are generally coordinated with
the Council on Aging and LexHab. Among the most pressing housing needs, according to the
staff director, are new units for the elderly, but federal and state agencies are currently cutting
back to zero new units and are reducing the funds that landlords are paid.
5. Lexington Fire Department (LFD). This agency, on call twenty-four hours a day,
seven days a week, holds to a standard of responding to the needs of everyone who calls.
Obviously, they respond immediately to calls about fires but they also send their Emergency
Medical Service officers to carry the sick to hospitals. In cases that are not health emergencies,
LFD makes referrals to state as well as town agencies.
LFD recognizes itself to be a point of first contact. They deal with people who need to
talk, who are seriously lonely, and the maltreated, among others. The Chief estimates LFD
makes about five to ten referrals to other agencies each month. Their confidential fax lines are
open all of the time in order to make referrals to the local Department of Social Services and to
other local and state agencies. And, on request from other agencies, they act to bring fire safety
advice and guidance to targeted persons and households.
6. Lexington Board of Health (BH). While the mission of this agency is broad, its
interactions with residents are concentrated very heavily on listening to the needs of senior
citizens. Most of the time, BH staff work on referring seniors to the Department of Social
Services lodged in the Senior Center. Calls about housing needs are the most frequent by far.
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These number only about five callers a year. BH also deals with a few calls that it refers to
the Fire and Police departments. The numbers of calls annually is quite steady.
7. Lexington Police Department (LPD). Most of the needs of visitors and callers to this
agency are channeled to the Family Support Officer, Christina Demambro. Her workload
consists mainly of senior residents, problem youth such as runaways, and domestic violence
cases. Need for help with transportation is a major item for the seniors, along with requests for
fuel assistance and food. She has met with only two homeless adults in the past year. Nearly all
of her calls from seniors are effectively taken up by Social Services at the Senior Center, and the
Lexington Food Pantry is readily available to help as well. She also makes direct calls for help
from state agencies and the staff of the Concord Courthouse.
LPD has responded to about 100 cases in the past year. The numbers are rising because
the position of Family Support Officer was vacated during the town budget cutback in 2004 and
news has circulated that it is currently restored to the staff. Many of the adolescent cases reach
her from the public schools of Lexington. When couples are conflicting but do not want to be
served by LPD, the officer refers them to the social agency Wayside, now located in Milford.
A booklet about where and who to turn to in Lexington would be a significant help in
meeting the needs of people who reach the LPD. A teen center would also be an urgently helpful
resource for the town.
8. Lexington Public Schools (LPS). Lexington High is staffed and organized to identify
and provide assistance to students in need through its Guidance and Nursing personnel. Staff in
these units include administrators, guidance counselors, registered nurses, and outreach workers.
They maintain a procedure in which all new and transfer students register with them upon entry.
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Special education evaluations, including home visits, are conducted when indicatated, and
weekly staff meetings are held to review the status of students in need or under Individual
Educational Plan conditions. The Guidance Department also assists students and parents to
obtain services outside of the school through the town Youth Services Coordinator in the
Department of Social Services, or arranging visits to the Edinburg Center or hospital or clinic
programs in the region.
While guidance counselors and outreach workers help with referrals to pediatricians,
psychiatrists, psychotherapists, and other specialists, nurses collaborate with the Lexington Lions
club in finding free services for students in need of eyeglasses who cannot afford them. The
Angel Fund in Lexington also works with nurses to provide winter coats, hats and gloves to
families in need of basic winter clothing. Becky Rushford, the town Youth Services Coordinator,
works regularly with professional therapists practicing in Lexington who are interested in
offering consultative services to Lexington High students or families.
Lexington High does not keep statistical records about students struggling with deficits in
basic needs. Not only are records of counseling contacts not kept, identification and efforts to
assist are conducted on a case by case basis. The staff vary in their impressions of whether the
numbers of students with basic needs is fairly constant, rising, or declining.
The school is fully involved in the operations of the newly formed Youth Services
Council which is coordinated by the Youth Services Coordinator and which does not function as
a town agency or unit of government. The Guidance Director at the high school is urgently
concerned to maintain the position of Youth Services Coordinator, and he is convinced that the
system districtwide would work much better if the district had a K-12 Director of Guidance and
Human Services in place.
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The district's two public middle schools each employ one guidance counselor for each of
their three grades. Our interviews indicated that these professionals work to identify and help
students with basic needs but that they do not know much about or feel part of a town-wide
social service system. They seem to be lacking in knowledge about how to operate on health
and housing needs. They are particularly aware, however, of the unmet needs of households in
transportation. Some students from homes with low incomes are unable to attend after-school
programs for tutoring, sports, and extracurricular activities in general because the district
provides no late bus services and the bus service that does exist is expensive. Some of the
counselors believe that a teen center would be especially valuable.
Both middle schools seem lacking in knowledgability about town services. A
comprehensive booklet of information would be very worthwhile.
9. Lexington Clergy Association (LCA). Houses of worship in Lexington are linked
together through the LCA. It has a chairperson and conducts common business at its regular
monthly luncheon meetings. The levels and specifics of resources and services provided are
highly variable from place to place and each place works within its own policies and practices.
Ministers, priests and rabbis most often hold discretionary funds which they dispense under
variable terms and conditions to persons who call or visit for help. This help includes provision
of coupons for goods and lodging. Others maintain collection baskets for foodstuffs that are
donated to households in need.
We could not learn about how many persons and households are helped by members of
the LCA, which does not maintain general intake records. Members estimated that on average
they received two requests per month. LCA members discussing these questions at a monthly
meeting agreed that they had witnessed increases in mental health service needs, youth crises,
and households with pressing debt problems over the past year.
IL OUT-OF-TOWN SERVICES.
10. Bristol Lodge for Women. This is a housing shelter for women only based in
Waltham. About 500 women were served last year. They came in from the surrounding region
and include an estimated ten women from Lexington. Bristol keeps records on its clients from
Waltham and Newton only because these towns contribute to its funding.
The need for beds is rising. There was a 50 percent increase in 2005 over previous years
for example, including many homeless women who hold jobs during the day but cannot afford
housing of their own. The shelter is packed to overflowing every night, even during the warm
weather season. Bristol staff try to help clients find low cost housing and they collaborate with
the Lexington Housing Authority, among many other agencies in the area, but on average such
housing entails a two year waiting list.
There is also a Lodge for men which operates on very similar lines, but we did not
interview this location. We did learn that a few Lexington men utilize it each year.
11. Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance (DTA). This agency,
located at 200 Pleasant Street, in Malden, once served as the state welfare department. It has
several cash assistance programs to help individuals and families who fall into the income
guidelines. They provide food stamps as well. One of their cash assistance programs provides
$380 s month to elderly and disabled individuals who have no other sources of income. They
also provide cash assistance to families with dependent children 18 years and under, and an
emergency assistance shelter program for homeless persons and a teen parent shelter for women
who are pregnant or have young offspring and are homeless. A few people from Lexington use
the services of DTA. The number of clients from the region is rising currently.
12. Waltham Support Committee for Battered Women, now called REACH. This
agency provides emergency services, a 24 hour hotline, housing shelter, and support services
including support groups and individual counseling, for individuals and families who are
escaping domestic violence. REACH focuses its services on persons from 27 surrounding
communities, including Lexington.
A handful of clients have come from Lexington over the last two years. Clients generally
come from all over the state, including many from Boston. Many do not say where they are
coming from, of course, and REACH does not keep records from the hotline. Callers who are
ready to leave their situations are connected with the shelter; others are connected to the support
group or to counselors.
REACH collaborates regularly with the Lexington Domestic Violence Response Team
which is maintained by the Police Department. Staff leaders are currently working with the
Department to identify a civilian advocate to bring into service with Lexington residents. They
partner with other agencies in their service area.
13. Community Day Center. This program for the homeless is based in a Presbyterian
church and operates on weekday afternoons. In addition to providing a warm sheltered space, the
Center provides computers, internet access, telephone, voicemail, and mail addresses for the
clients. Its program have entered their third year of operations based on denominational grants
and are barely surviving financially.
Most clients have an addiction, a major mental illness, or both. Three-fourths are
homeless and come over mainly from Bristol Lodge. A few of the others live in group homes or
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room with someone. Approximately 500 persons have used the Center over the past twelve
months, numbering 60 a day in the winter and 40 in the summer months. Homeless persons who
live temporarily in the Battlegreen Inn come over to the Center in the afternoons. Many of them
stay their three month limit in the motel as well as at Bristol Lodge and then move out, sharing
a room somewhere with others they have met at the Inn or the Lodge for a month, before they are
are permitted to return for another three month period.
Demand for Center participation is rising but the magnitude parallels the rise in demand
for services from the Waltham Salvation Army and, we learned, from the Waltham chapter of the
American Red Cross. The Center does not coordinate its work with agencies in Lexington but
has extensive collaboration with the city of Waltham, where the mayor is a strong supporter.
The Waltham Police Department maintains a Homeless Assistance Coalition which reaches out
to homeless persons in a humanitarian way. Our respondent noted that what is needed across the
metro region is much more low cost housing, more shelters, and more detoxification services.
14. Career Place. This agency, based in Woburn, is chartered by the Metro North
Regional Employment Board and managed by Middlesex Community College. Its mission is to
help clients find job openings, assist skill levels and interests, and help entry into job training
programs. The Place provides career counseling, employment workshops, and access to job
research tools, including the Internet and copy and fax machines. It hosted 9,000 people in the
past year, including 500 from Lexington.
The Career Place provides area businesses with a source for workers and training options.
Staff work with employers to locate qualified job applicants, upgrade the skills of their existing
employees, navigate training and economic development programs, and to provide timely online
labor market information. Employers in turn post current job openings and use the Place
conference rooms for on-site interviewing and recruiting.
The Career Place is supported by 30 funding sources. At times of large downsizing in
firms in the area served, it gets emergency grants and additional funds to assist with large
numbers of unemployed workers. The use of the Place is increasing year by year. Letters of
termination that workers receive from their firms often contain information about the Place.
The Place holds four large job fairs each year.
People from Lexington also utilize the Career Place based in Cambridge. This Place is a
bit larger and served 11,500 persons last year; the number from Lexington is unknown.
15. Joseph M. Smith Community Health Center. This is a non-profit agency in
Waltham whose mission is to provide comprehensive, culturally competent, and affordable
primary health care and selected family specialties to all individuals and households in
surrounding communities. It has been operating, primarily in Allston, Brighton, and Waltham,
for 35 years and receives funds from both state and federal sources. Its services include mental
health, dental, diabetes management, prenatal health care, gynecological care, WIC services,
youth therapy, and general medical diagnostic care.
The Center was visited by 42,000 persons in the past year, 22 of them from Lexington.
The overall numbers are rising annually.
16. Food Programs. There are food programs and pantries outside of Lexington that are
used by Lexington residents. These include the Bristol Lodge Soup Kitchen based at the
Immanuel Methodist Church in Waltham, which provides hot meals at 5:00 p.m. every day;
Grandma's Pantry at Christ Church in Waltham, limited to clients 60 years of age or older; the
Immanuel Methodist Food Pantry; Sacred Heart Food Pantry; and breakfasts and lunches at the
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Waltham Salvation Army in Waltham, on Mondays through Fridays.
Three other food pantries often drawn in Lexington residents and transient persons:
The Salvation Army Food Pantry of Waltham offers single bags of food for individuals and
double bags for families once a week on Thursdays. Users fill out an application form and
display ID but no one is turned away. It gets its food supplies from the Greater Boston Food
Bank, a large warehouse where foodstuffs are collected from food retailers and wholesalers and
then sold to local pantries at very low prices. This pantry supplied 3,492 persons and families in
2004. About 40 of them were from Lexington. Use of the pantry has risen by about 350 during
the past year and the number of Lexington residents, while small, has risen within this. Need
overall is outstripping the levels of donations of money and food.
The Red Cross Food Pantry in Waltham is used by a few Lexington residents. Food
stuffs, including fresh vegetables and meats, are drawn from the Greater Boston Food Bank and
their cost is charged against money contributions to the American Red Cross. About 20 percent
of the outlays come from local donations of food and money. About 5,000 individuals and
households utilized this pantry during the past year. Lexington residents using it numbered 84.
The number of clients has risen by nearly 150 percent over the past year and Lexington users
have risen within this increase. The Red Cross procedure entails completion of an application
form which calls for showing ID, documentation of annual income, and a listing of all household
members. Food is then provided immediately and up to once a month.
Some Lexington residents utilize the Bedford Community Table and Pantry each
Thursday afternoon. The Table serves a free dinner to all clients once a week. Bags of food, one
for individuals are more for households, are dispensed by the Pantry. Bedford residents donate
both the food and the money for these programs, and the money is used to buy foodstuffs in local
grocery store outlets.
This pantry serves an average of 83 individual and family clients each week. This number
rises to about 100 in the fall and winter months. About five clients are drawn weekly from
Lexington. Numbers of overall users are rising each year. At intake, clients fill out an application
form which includes ID and numbers of members in a household. Foodstuffs are then provided
immediately in plastic bags. Clients may draw on supplies once a month. The managers of these
three pantries and programs all state that clients use more than one agency source a week.
17. Legal Services. Two agencies provide legal services for county residents. One is the
South Middlesex Legal Services agency. To qualify for assistance, potential clients must meet an
income eligibility requirement. Incomes cannot be over 125 percent of the federal poverty line.
Even among those who are eligible, this agency turns away three out of every five applicants
because it lacks the resources to help them, even if they meet the income standard.
An estimated 21 clients from Lexington, about one percent of the agency total, were
helped between September 2004 and August 2005. They sought help mainly with issues in
housing, disability benefits, domestic violence, and education. The number of Lexington
residents seeking help has increased in recent years due to mortgage foreclosures and job layoffs
resulting in income losses.
Lexington residents also use the Senior Citizen Law Project of the Greater Boston Legal
Services agency(GBLS). There are no income eligibility standards but all clients must be 60
years of age or older. A total of 28 Lexington residents have sought help with such issues as
eviction, public benefits termination, nursing home problems, and indebtedness.
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There are too few resources in GBLS to help everyone who seeks assistance. Cases are
thus assessed on the merits, which include whether they fit in with priority topics and whether
clients have documents that will support their cases. Most referrals for Lexington come from the
Senior Center and the Minuteman Senior Services Agency, a state agency for the elderly.
18. Other Services. There are a few services available to Lexington residents and transits
that have not been described in this inventory. They include the Waltham Clothing Exchange,
the Briston Lodge for Men, the Edinburg Center and Eliot Community Mental Health Center
headquartered in Concord. Edinburg and Eliot were covered in full in our 2002 Committee report
on the availability of mental health services. We revisited these agencies for this project and
again learned that very few Lexington residents make use of either agency.
III. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
1.We learned from this project that somewhere between 150 and 300 Lexington residents
and transients draw annually on approximately twenty agency-based services of assistance. The
most widespread need is for food supplies and there are both individuals and households that
rotate around the ring of available food programs and food pantries in the area. These include the
Lexington Pantry which offers bags of staples but no lunch or dinner programs, and the Bedford
free dinners and Pantry, and five pantries and programs in Waltham. Bags of supplies are limited
to each recipient weekly but by rotating a person could obtain free supplies that would stretch to
cover two meals a day every day. Need and demand for free food is rising significantly,
according to workers in most of the agencies.
2. There is also substantial demand for housing. Short-term persons in need are sheltered
at the Battle Green Inn, which hosts about 30 individuals and families nightly for periods of three
months. These homeless are also housed in the Bristol Women's Shelter and Briston Men's
Shelter in Waltham. The number of low income and assisted rental units in Lexington falls far
below the level of annual demand. When the Battle Green Inn is demolished within the year,
there will be no short-term shelter placements available in town.
3.There is a large Career Place agency in Arlington, which provides a clearinghouse on
jobs,job counseling and training, and related services. Employers in the Metro Northwest area
are heavy participants in this agency and its use by unemployed individuals, including those
from Lexington, is great.
4. A large Clothing Exchange in Waltham provides free clothing to persons from
Lexington, and there is a small supply maintained at St. Bridget's Church as well. Houses of
worship in Lexington maintain and dispense discretionary funds to poor and disconnected
persons who telephone them and call on them, but we could not learn the scale of these funds,
which is kept quite private. Our best estimate is that the churches and synagogues assist about
50 persons each year.
5.Coordination between departments, school system units, and private agencies is, we
believe, exceptionally fragmented and weak. Many town professionals are earnest in seeking to
help persons in need, to be sure, but many of those in need do not know where to turn and the
various agents are not in systematic or coordinated touch with one another. The lead agency is of
course the Department of Social Services, whose very small staff work hard to meet local needs.
The department is housed within the Lexington Senior Center. Persons in need sometimes do not
know to locate the Center. Teachers and guidance counselors in the public schools face many of
the parents and students with urgent needs but expressed uncertainty about where to turn for
collaborative help in town.
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6. We make the following recommendations to the Lexington Board of Selectmen:
a. The Board should adopt a policy of directing the Town Department of Social Services
to develop a booklet of guidance to services which can be used by all town agencies and private
service providers and by all prospective individuals and families in need. It should include full
information about out-of-town programs and agencies as well as the steps to be followed in
seeking help. This booklet should entail collaboration with all of the town agencies described in
this report, including public school system personnel. Ample copies of the booklet should be
produced at town expense and be distributed to all of the agency points cited in this report.
b. A phone line that will connect callers to the Department of Social Services in a direct
way rather than through the line of the Senior Center should be installed and set up so that the
Social Service Coordinator may be contacted directly or receive voice mail messages. (This is
currently being implemented).
c. The Board should establish a planning group to work on the question of where
homeless persons and households can be placed when the Battle Green Inn is demolished.
The Waltham Bristol Lodges are short of beds right now.
d. Having found that Lexington and the surrounding towns of Waltham, Arlington,
Bedford and Woburn offer a considerable range of services, we also noted that these are
generally uncoordinated and fragmented organizationally. We recommend that the Lexington
Board of Selectmen should direct the Department of Social Services to begin to initiate a
regionally coordinated and collaborative approach with these key surrounding towns, protecting
the provision of client privacy, of course.
e. The School Department should make a further evaluation of the transportation needs
of students in the elementary and middle schools. A plan should be implemented that can include
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voluntary efforts - like those of FISH - and more complete use of LexPress to accommodate
these needs.
f. The Selectmen and the School Committee should support efforts to established a
community youth center to serve as outreach to Lexington's "disconnected youth," among
others. The urgent need for a youth center has been identified by several citizen groups and
by the young people people themselves as an important need in Lexington.
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