Twelve years ago, newly elected Cambridge City Councillor Marc McGovern held some big ideas about how to help Cambridge’s homeless population when he was speaking to a group of unhoused people at First Parish Church on a day in early December.
“I was talking to them about what the city could be doing to support unhoused people in a better way. I was talking to people about job training … raising the minimum wage, and all these kinds of bigger issues,” McGovern said. “This one woman was like, ‘Right now I just really need some blankets because it’s cold.’”
McGovern still believes in these big ideas, but the conversation was also a reality check about what it was really like to go without a roof over one’s head in a city where temperatures at night are below freezing for nearly a third of the year.
Every year since, he’s run a winter warmth drive to raise money to keep Cambridge’s unhoused warm during the winter months, first by buying blankets, then switching to sleeping bags.
The goal: raise $20,000 for 400 sleeping bags, with any extra money going toward other items to keep warm like hand warmers and socks. First Parish hosts the landing page for donations, and the First Step Street Outreach program administered by Bay Cove Human Services takes charge of distribution.
McGovern said he originally wanted the city to fund the initiative, but the city’s procurement process and rules about donating to charities made it too onerous. “I was like, ‘all right, well then I’m just going to do it myself.’” Since then, more than $200,000 has been raised from the Cambridge community.
Winter months pose unique challenges
The sleeping bags can be lifesavers, said First Step Director Alexis Grandberg. She said they don’t just provide warmth. Unlike blankets, they also offer people experiencing homelessness a buffer from the rest of the world, as well as a space to keep belongings out of the open.
“People are so grateful,” she said. “We get calls all the time for sleeping bags, all year round.”
Grandberg runs a team of people tasked with checking in on Cambridge and Somerville’s homeless, many of whom she’s gotten to know personally over the years. The group is responsible for canvassing streets from 2 p.m. to midnight every day, offering meals, clothes and information on how to access other services.
Last year was Boston’s coldest and snowiest on record since the infamous “Snowmageddon” winter of 2014-2015, with two major winter storms that forced local shelters to operate at expanded capacity. But providing a roof for all of Cambridge’s unhoused population, which is currently about 400 according to city data, can be a difficult coordination challenge in a city with relatively small shelters, the largest serving 60 people.
Staying outside has obvious risks during cold nights, like one in December of 2025 that claimed the life of Carvell Curry, an unhoused man who was found dead outside Boston’s South Station.
“There are people that are never going to come inside, no matter what,” Grande said. She cited factors such as “the freedom of being able to do what you want to do,” like avoiding places that restrict drug use or not having to abandon their belongings by going into a shelter that won’t store them. There are also practical issues, like finding transportation to shelters, or the mental health of a person preventing them from realizing that they’re experiencing homelessness in the first place.
Grandberg said the goal is to get clients through to the next day.
“We work on what people want to work on, not pushing any agenda, whether it’s recovery, whether it’s shelter, whether it’s housing,” she said.
Donations for the Winter Warmth Drive are open until Nov. 9. Donors can donate online or by sending a check addressed to First Parish Church at First Parish, 3 Church Street, Cambridge, MA 02138 with “Winter Warmth Drive” on the memo line.
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