While the weather was cold and wet, marchers said that when you're homeless you have to deal with whatever surprises nature has in store.

Planned for months by a coalition of activists and organizations from the Cambridge and Somerville communities, the Somerville march started off in Mystic Housing and went on to Union Square where the marchers had a rally with Michelle Fine of Respond who spoke about the link between domestic violence and poverty, and Jack Hamilton, director of Community Action Agency of Somerville (CAAS), who spoke on the lack of progress this country has made since the War on Poverty was declared 40 years ago by Lyndon Johnson.

The marchers continued up Somerville Ave with a stop at the Share Group offices on Dover St. where the labor dispute has been going on. They serenaded Share with anti-union-busting chants and a solidarity picket before continuing on to Davis Square for a final rally.

Speakers at the Davis Square rally included Basav Sen of Bankbusters who spoke about the World Bank Bond Boycott and the effort to get Somerville to pass this ban, and Mark Alston-Follansbee of the Somerville Homeless Coalition who talked about the skewed priorities of our federal and state governments and the local homeless crisis.

State Rep. Patricia D. Jehlen, D-Somerville, also spoke at the rally in Davis Square. "The biggest poverty problem in Somerville is housing. It would cost a lot of money to solve the housing crisis in Somerville, but it would be a cinch for the federal government to take care of it. On the other hand, it is very hard for the state or the city to pick up the slack – so the problem remains unsolved. What that illustrates is how far our political culture is from caring about poverty," Jehlen said. "The political climate wasn’t always so deaf to the needs of the poor. During the progressive era, the New Deal, and the War on Poverty, we made some great gains in fighting poverty," she said. "Now we’re fighting just to preserve a portion of those gains. That’s very discouraging to me."

At the end of the Somerville March, Bill Bumpus, a member of the Somerville Green-Rainbow Party who helped to organize the Somerville march, was pleased with the results. "The main goal of the march was to point out the problem of poverty in Massachusetts, and to get attention from the government and the press, and to bring organizers from different communities together," said Bumpus. "I think we made good progress on those goals. This was a first step – we are only beginning."

The following day, the Cambridge march started at Youth on Fire, a drop-in center for homeless youth in Harvard Square. Visible from Mass Ave, the opening rally featured two formerly homeless youth who spoke of the importance of safe spaces for the homeless to seek comfort, and of the need for expanding the types of services offered.

Crystal Evans, who has recently found housing, had been a regular at Youth on Fire for over a year. She was forced into homelessness after an accident resulting in brain injury and accumulated medical debt on her road to recovery. Addressing the crowd, Evans warned "it could happen to any of you." She added, "I don't know how I would have survived without Youth on Fire." While maintaining a popular weblog called beinghomeless.com has provided her an outlet and a voice, the homeless population is typically on the periphery of public concern. Jesse Cardoso, who works for Youth on Fire as a Youth Health Educator, spoke of the amazing opportunities Youth on Fire provides to homeless youth, but called for an expansion of services that are offered to the homeless and those on the edge of becoming homeless.

State Representative Alice Wolf braved the cold weather to demonstrate to the crowd that advocates often do have friends in the legislature. Like Rep. Pat Jehlen did one day earlier in Somerville, Rep. Wolf spoke of the need to speak up for the crucial services that keep people safe, with the basic care and dignity that they deserve. Also addressing the crowd were Lisa Richards, the statewide coordinator for the first-of-its-kind march, and Eli Beckerman, one of the Cambridge and Somerville organizers for the march. The crowd of about 100 people then marched, with signs, banners, and flags in hand, through Harvard Square, down Putnam Avenue to Cambridgeport, into Area 4, and ultimately to the abandoned gas station at Lafayette Square.

Chants like "Hey-hey! Ho-ho! Poverty has got to go!" challenged shoppers in Harvard Square who were clearly not aware of the march. Aimee Smith, of Mystic River Green-Rainbow Action (MRGRA) passed out fliers to those in the path of the march. "People were fairly receptive to the idea of economic justice, but a lot of people questioned whether poverty can be abolished", said Smith. "But that just shows the importance of the march. We need to transform people's assumptions that we are powerless in the face of poverty. We, the people, must demand a say in shaping the priorities of our communities. Corporations like Sharegroup or MIT can't be trusted to address human needs, they benefit when unions and the overall community fabric are weakened." Smith was a candidate for Cambridge City Council last year, running largely on a platform supporting the rent control ballot question which ultimately failed.

Along the route, another MRGRA member and longtime Cambridge housing activist Bill Cunningham pointed out the historical significance to the current housing crisis of a variety of sites. Showing everyone an apartment he used to live in on Putnam, where he paid $70 a month in rent, Cunningham said "and that was before rent control. It was also before the explosion of enrollment at Harvard University in the 60s. Ever since then, Cambridge residents have been squeezed out of their apartments as the rents have skyrocketed."

At a stop on Norfolk Street, Ellen Shachter of Cambridge and Somerville Legal Services, along with Nancy Hall of the Eviction-Free Zone, spoke about a victory for tenant organizing which led to one permanent affordable housing success. The march then continued to Lafayette Square, where the gas station obtained by Cambridge through eminent domain in 1997 remains abandoned. According to Cunningham, the City plans to turn the square into a park which would cut off Main Street from Mass Ave. in order to serve the growing needs of MIT and Harvard, as well as to help separate the Area 4 neighborhood from MIT's University Park. Hanging a 20-foot banner which read "Public Space for People Not Universities", Homes Not Jails, a squatter’s rights group, closed the rally and the march by providing coffee and vegan food from Food Not Bombs.

Hoping to spark a movement based on the idea that poverty is not inevitable, especially in the richest nation in the world, some of the marchers have called themselves "the new abolitionists". The statewide march culminated in Boston City Hall the following day, April 4th-- the 36th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. Killed while organizing a Poor People's March on Washington, King was trying to connect the "giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism" which continue to this day.