Cambridge Police Department spokesperson Frank D. Pasquarello points to growing “concerns” since the city cut back the rehabilitation centers.
In response to rising complaints, he says, the department has sent more officers to the Porter Square area within the last two months.
Even so, the neighbors association is lobbying for more significant increases in police presence.
Cambridge Police Sergeant Dennis O’Connor, who had been invited to answer questions at the association meeting, promised that the police would immediately start devoting more time to Porter Square’s problems.
“I’ll make sure as of tomorrow that there’s more visibility here,” he said.
He also said the Porter Square neighborhood needs to emphasize “consistency” in the way it deals with the problem. People should refrain from giving to panhandlers and know how to alert the police to disruptive activity without relying on 911.
The association is producing a pamphlet to educate the community about these issues, including a list of non-emergency police numbers.
Representatives from the nearby North Charles Institute for the Addictions, who attended the association meeting, say drug users often tend to form communities such as the one that seems to be plaguing Porter Square.
“If you’re addicted to drugs other than what’s legal, you do have to find networks of people who abuse the same drugs,” says Sharon G. Hartunian, a clinical supervisor at the institute.
One association member asked whether shopkeepers could provide the institute with photographs of disruptive individuals, so that it could take measures against them if they happened to be clients.
But Hartunian and her colleague said they had no jurisdiction outside of the clinic. They acknowledged that a small number of their clients are prone to disruptive and frightening behavior. But as for what goes on beyond the clinic’s doors, they said, the institute can only “ask them to be respectful and mindful of our reputation in the community.”
Many association members say that even if they have sympathy for derelicts, they are angry and frustrated by the disturbances in the square.
Evelyn M. Murray, Lenthall’s husband and owner of Atholl Brose Scottish Imports, says her clients come largely from rural areas and tend to be easily turned off by unruly loiterers.
“They’re scared of the big city,” she says, adding that Porter Square has traditionally been known as less intimidating than other parts of Cambridge.
“I’m sympathetic to the homeless,” she says, “but I’m not sympathetic to those who yell, use bad language and worse things than that.”
—Staff writer Eugenia B. Schraa can be reached at schraa@fas.harvard.edu.