Massachusetts Immigration

< Back to Massachusetts Immigration Resources

Impact on Environment and Quality of Life Water

Massachusetts will need to increase public water supplies by 62 percent in the next 30 years, from its current capacity of 740 million gallons per day to 1.2 billion gallons per day, according to state environmentalist specialists. In the communities in the I-495 area, water needs will increase by 75 percent during that time period. Even if all potential untapped water resources are fully used in the future, the area will still have a shortfall of 32 million gallons a day.7

Population growth in small towns is straining local water systems, and many communities are imposing touch water use restrictions. Hopkinton banned all watering in spring of 2002, even for people who drilled private wells specifically for irrigation systems. The town attributes the need for the strict measure to the area’s explosive growth.8

Traffic: As population growth put more traffic on the roads, the average commute for Massachusetts residents increased 19 percent during the 1990s, from 23 minutes to 27 minutes in 2000 (versus a national average of 14 percent).9

Boston is already the country’s seventh most congested city, and traffic continues to worsen. Congestion costs each Boston motorist three days and $1,255 each year. Rush hour lasts for four hours every morning and every evening, costing the average commuter 107 gallons of wasted gas every year.10

Disappearing open space: Each year, Massachusetts loses 42,400 acres of open space and farmland due to development.11 In 1970, just 22 percent of the land in the 43 communities in the I-495 area was developed, but by 1999, 60 percent of the area’s land had been developed.12

Crowded housing: 26,000 Massachusetts households are defined as severely crowded by housing authorities, a 43 percent increase since 1990.13 Studies show that a rise in crowded housing often correlates with an increase in the number of foreign-born.14,15

Affordable housing: As population increases, the affordable housing supply often drops. Massachusetts workers who earn minimum wage would need to work 125 hours per week in order to afford a two-bedroom unit at the area’s fair market rent. Massachusetts’s housing wage (the amount a full-time worker must earn per hour to afford a two-bedroom apartment at fair market rent) is $21.14, but its minimum wage is $6.75.16

Poverty: 14 percent of immigrants in Massachusetts have incomes below the poverty level. Among non-citizens, the rate climbs to 19 percent.17

The majority of working-age immigrants in Massachusetts have only a high school degree or less. Immigrant families account for 36 percent of all poor families in the state even though they are only 14 percent of the households. Immigrant families are also growing poorer relative to native families. In 1989, the median income for immigrant families in Massachusetts was 70 percent of the median income for native families; by 1997, it had dropped to 60 percent. 40 percent of the children in immigrant families live in poverty (compared to 11 percent for natives).18

Contact Massachusetts Immigration Attorneys

Top of Page