A daylong mediation session over unhoused people resting overnight at a North Cambridge church has brought some promise of peace, but condominium owners urged the city on Monday to direct more services there too – leading some to ponder a model for improvements that could be applied citywide.
The issue arose first at the City Council’s summer meeting, held Aug. 4, but was put on hold by the mayor for the mediation to take place. That happened Friday, said residents of the Saint James Place condos, a four-story, 46-unit ell-shaped structure that opened in 2021 around the St. James’s Episcopal Church at 7 Beech St. near Porter Square.
Though the mediated agreement isn’t at the final, signed agreement stage, talks held at lawyers’ offices could lead to changes including installation of a 6-foot wrought-iron fence around the garden between the two structures, with costs split between the church and condominiums, a resident said.
With the mediation having taken place, the City Council’s call to monitor the garden became ready for a vote. It passed unanimously.
While the order names police and its unarmed Public Safety Department in asking for more attention to the scene of the conflict, vice mayor and social worker Marc McGovern noted that the language refers also to “other relevant entities.”
“I hope that includes the service providers that are working with a lot of these unhoused folks, like the folks from 240 Albany and maybe some of the other shelter providers,” McGovern said. Also, “having some conversations with the unhoused folks themselves directly about what they need, including them in the conversation, is important.”
A Public Safety meeting should be called to expand on these ideas, said that committee’s co-chair with McGovern, councillor Ayesha Wilson, mulling “making sure that we have services that are beyond the hours of 9 to 5. We need to look at overnight support and care.”
“Our police department are a great resource, and they do what they can do and what they need to do,” Wilson said. “We need other holistic services and supports to be in place as well.”
Church took action
The issue addressed in the order is that the unhoused people invited by the church to take shelter overnight in the 1871 structure’s three porches have sometimes been loud and messy, residents say, and have left behind evidence of drug use and violated the requirement of staying out of the garden after dusk.
The church took action when the number of unhoused – and the signs of their presence – grew, said Alice Killian, junior warden at the church.
“For as long as I’ve been attending St James’s, we have had people sleeping on our porches,” Killian said. “Starting last summer, we saw an increase in porch use by groups. There were more personal possessions left behind, and sometimes pieces of large cardboard for makeshift weather shelters. We also saw evidence of drug use.” In response, she said, the church forms a team of volunteers who would take turns every morning to move late sleepers along and help them clean, bringing garbage bags, brooms and sharps-disposal boxes.
This summer, the church hired a community engagement associate “to connect with our unhoused and housed neighbors,” Killian said.
Because serving the unhoused is part of St James’s calling and service, parishioners have already been working with resources, church member Carolann Barrett said, referring to FirstStep, the outreach team from shelter operator Bay Cove Caspar, and police. “We’re doing everything we can in the mornings to do checks, including on city-owned sidewalks. We have told unhoused folks on our porches about our expectations and rules. We have also issued no-trespass orders against individuals when warranted,” she said.
Disagreement over conditions
The church’s Rebekah Bjork said reports to the council last month of the garden being littered with trash, needles and feces during the day “is just not true” – that the church has “had a proactive practice of daily checks for items by parishioners.”
Public comment to the council was “reporting items found last year,” Bjork said. “We heard their concerns and changed our practices to ensure that this no longer happens … and the overwhelming message I have heard from multiple [police] officers is that our property is not an area they consider a problem spot.” The church’s Rev. Matthew Stewart said the idea that the unhoused people make the space “unsafe” is an issue of fragility among the privileged.
That reflects the church’s lack of understanding of the situation at night – sometimes as late as 3 to 6 a.m. when the condo owners are awoken by behavior others aren’t around to experience.
“They refuse to come out at night and see it,” said Susan Miller-Havens, a psychiatric nurse who helped found a program treating drug addiction at the Cambridge Hospital in 1968. “We’re the people taking care of the garden at night. the fact they won’t come out there is just remarkable.”
A call to add services
Barrett said she spoke Monday with a representative from the Community Safety Department’s Community Assistance Response and Engagement team, but it “provides 51 hours of daytime support for people experiencing mental health and behavioral challenges. That’s 51 hours out of 160 weekly hours.”
“I encourage the council and the Community Safety Department to consider additional funding for this 24/7 service. All of these teams are doing great work around the city, and none of them is ignoring our property or activities on it,” Barrett said. “I’m interested in what the city does in response to similar complaints around the city.”
Residents at the Saint James Place condos were equally as emphatic about the need for resources.
“We need integrated services to work with the unhoused. We need public health and public safety services,” said Stephen Bardige, head of the condo trustees, to city councillors. “To the extent we can get some services there at night – at 1, 2, 3, 4 o’clock in the morning – we think that would be very helpful.”
Miller-Havens also called for more funding for the Care team and wanted the order to include specific funding for late-night services. “We need them at night to minister to those in need,” she said.
This post was updated Sept. 9, 2025, to correct the spelling of a name and change how the status of a formal mediated agreement is described.
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The Church has posted multiple messages saying that people can sleep on its porches at night but that the gardens are closed during certain hours.
The porches are not legal sleeping areas and St. James has neither the occupancy permit nor the trained staff to run a homeless shelter.
The state’s building and sanitation codes define and set requirements for things like sleeping areas and residential and St. James’ porches don’t meet those requirements. As a result, the church is providing residential space they cannot legal offer.
There is a reason, often as a response to a tragic event, that we have these codes. They make buildings more expensive and more complex, but they also make them safer, easier to manage and more comfortable.
If St. James wants to provide these services, they should do it the right way and follow the appropriate health and safety codes, hire appropriate staff and manage the space like a responsible party.