Life sciences lawyer Megan Gates takes over as Pine Street Inn’s new board chair

The Boston Globe featured Megan Gates in its “Bold Types” column about the movers and shakers on Boston’s business scene. Megan was featured due to her new role as board chair at Pine Street Inn, the homeless services nonprofit based in Boston.

Megan said she’s been encouraged by the growing emphasis at Pine Street Inn to develop apartments where previously unhoused people can live, with support services to keep them off the streets and help them rebuild their lives.

“To witness the evolution toward housing with supportive services is demonstrative of what can happen when we put our minds towards how we can create an environment where people can live and thrive and rebuild their lives,” Megan said. The Lyndia, which offers 140 units to chronically homeless people, was trumpeted as the largest “permanent supportive
housing development” in New England when it opened last year. Several of the city’s biggest corporate players — such as Liberty Mutual, Suffolk Construction, and Mass General Brigham — contributed millions of dollars to make it happen.

“It’s incumbent on the business community to be mindful of how people are able to afford to live in this community, and what we are doing to support that,” Megan noted. “Boston is a wonderful community, in that regard. There’s a sense of ‘to whom much has been given, much is expected.’”