Same reason Fitchburg students don’t stay in Fitchburg

Tetasset Ridge/God’s Acre by the airport has some awesome trails and is just enough out of the way that there’s hardly anyone there. Great place for dog walking. Tons of other green space in Worcester as well

same. out of curiosity, is there anything that you ever wish Elm Park had? i think about it a lot, and personally i wish there were more plants/flowers, benches, and maybe like a small fountain plaza for gatherin

try visiting the Worcester public library! they have a lot of brochures you can take, but also someone at the desk may be able to give you first hand insight about local community events/orgs/clubs

juuust be careful. i don't recommend making exercise your only outlet rn, nor tying your self esteem to your body's specs :-/ also can't recommend spending all your time at the gym as a particularly great way to meet people, but that's my experience

investing your time in a variety of hobbies that interest you is healthy - pumping iron not excluded if that's genuinely your thing

Because, honestly, there are other cities that are more attractive on the surface. Worcester is a great place to raise a family, but when you are in your early 20s, that's not what you are looking for.

It’s so much easier to take a photo and post it on Reddit for karma.

As others have said, it's not as easy as deregulating some 1925 zoning law and the problem is solved. I'm all for assisting homeless and those trying to manage some addictions but I'm weary of just turning a residential house into a boarding house willy nilly.

There is a residential halfway house in my neighborhood that most neighbors want to evict. Other folks in Worcester are quick to call you a NIMBY when you speak out about it but the problem is that it brings a lot of baggage with it. The house/yard are absolutely littered with trash and cigarette butts. There's constant traffic and activity late into the night that disturbs neighbors including frequent arguments. Strange men sleep in tents on the lawn/steps on occasion because its a women's only house. When somebody moves out, they will frequently just leave all their trash and unwanted belongings on the sidewalk. Some tenants simply don't care about the people next to them because they will move on in 2 months and leave a mess for us to deal with.

Zoning change sounds like a nice idea on paper but thus far, from what I've seen in my neighborhood, I'm not sold.

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De-institutionalizing was the best and worst thing ever done in the mental health world. The new DMH treatment model (ACCS) could work wonders for people, except it's underfunded and understaffed and the people who utilize it refuse to ever discharge despite it being the intended purpose of it. Even the people who work for the agencies that provide this treatment plan don't want to work on discharging people, so the ones who don't have help cant get help.

I have a lot of clients I work with who live in boarding houses. None of them are worth thinking twice about. Drugs, prostitution, deadbeat landlords, unmedicated mentally ill people, rats, roaches, bed bugs, gangs and violence. SROs are not the answer.

If you just spent the previous 4 years of your life living in the areas of Worcester where the majority of the college kids live would you stay here? At least in places like Boston and NYC you can live in a shit hole and walk or take public transport somewhere awesome. You cant really do that here.

Same here. Worcester has practically no good engineering jobs. But even beyond engineering, Worcester has very few good jobs of any type for young people at growing, dynamic companies.

I stayed and I don’t regret it. The city is getting better and as I grow on my career it seems like the city does aswell. I just wish there were more incentive to stay, like rent being cheap but its not the case. The rent and house price are stupid right now and I can only imagine a recent graduate trying to find a place to live… Like average graduate probably get $50K a year first job on average but then rent is 2K a month. Thats half their salary in RENT!!! Something has to be done.

The homeless population is a lot more than just people without a house: there are deeply-rooted addiction and psychological issues in homelessness that a "room with a lock" isn't going to fix. And that's one of the reasons towns banned boarding houses (aka flop houses) 100 years ago. We need to adjust the zoning and regulatory environment that exacerbates the cost of urban development, and we need safe, regulated, institutions for addicted, mentally ill people. Legalized flop houses are not a solution.

Before reading: Is it jobs?

After reading: Yes, it's jobs.

Surprise!

Plus, most the best jobs in the state are out east. A lot of the people moving here are either working remote or getting priced out of the Boston area. Why stay in Worcester when you can make twice as much an hour away?

As a former Worcester college student, all the engineering jobs relevant to me are clustered around Boston. No way I’m sitting in traffic on the pike, even if rent is a bit cheaper. I’d love to live in Worcester, and I miss the huge number of nature trails and paths, but it just isn’t feasible

Completely agree!

because most people want to go live in a big city like Boston or NYC. Worcester is awesome, but if you're asking a 22 year old to choose between Worcester, Boston, or NYC, you're going to have a hard time finding people to choose Worcester. It isn't even that there aren't jobs or fun things to do. But at that age people want to live with their friends. Easier to get a group to commit to Boston or NYC than Worcester

The only wish I have for this is that these boarding houses are inspected regularly to make sure they are well maintained and any potential for crime is discouraged. People who need a place to stay for how ever long, do not need to live in a place that turns to squalor and end up being a dangerous blight.

Because it’s really difficult to afford rising rent prices on top of college debt and entry level jobs.

I think it’s more like 85% lol

The trash that’s apart of Worcester 🚮.

Stay the fuck away from Kelly sq rotary