HOMELESSNESS IN MONTPELIER?: A tent near the Winooski River located near the Montpelier High School.
Federal funding to house otherwise homeless Vermonters in hotels throughout the state is coming to an end and the state is still in the thick of public debate over what to do or not do about it.
Twitter buzz
The Essex GOP was on top of the development.
Policy Matters. Parc 55 by Hilton Hotels stopped payment on their $725 million dollar non-recourse loan and surrendered the properties to the bank. That's a big loss to quit the city. Do you think California's policies are working?#vtyr#vtgop#vtpoli https://t.co/q6fElBkOJ5
— EssexVTGOP (@essexvtgop) June 12, 2023
Former gubernatorial candidate for the Democrat Party Brenda Siegel shared her concerns about the latest developments.
It is incumbent upon us to lift up the voices of people who asked to have their voices heard. We have had the opportunity to hear from more people experiencing homelessness than in the past. When we share these, PLEASE lift up these voices. #vtpoli #crisisinvt
— Brenda Siegel (@BrendaForVT) June 12, 2023
Some are sounding the alarm that the abrupt end of this program is going to exacerbate an already unfortunate situation regarding homelessness in Vermont.
I'm blown away by the stories and fears of the individuals I've met with whom are experiencing homelessness.
THESE are the voices that matter above any other.#vtpoli— Rebecca Duprey (@BekkaDuprey) June 12, 2023
Another poster suggests that the average homeless person is no longer mostly just people we never knew or interacted with, but relatives.
The vulnerable Vermonters being put into the street by our illustrious legislature are likely people you know. They are your sisters, cousins, children, parents, and uncles. They are the lady who rang up your order at Maplefields and the girl who babysat your kids. #vtpoli https://t.co/9aYy9MRnwp
— Gyandevi (@Gyandevi) June 9, 2023
Report indicates that homelessness is rising
A new report called the 2023 Vermont’s Annual Point-In-Time Count regarding the state of homelessness in Vermont indicates that there are three main factors that are driving homelessness up.
“We believe that this increase is due, in part, to (1) the termination in the fall of 2022 of rent
subsidies provided to lower-income Vermonters through the Emergency Rental Assistant
program, and the end of the eviction moratorium in July 2022, both resulting in increased
housing instability,” the conclusion states.
It continues that the next reason has to do with limited housing availability. It says that “the extremely low vacancy rate for apartments in much of Vermont, ranging from 0.5% to 3% across the state, allowing landlords to increase rents and to be highly selective in choosing tenants.”
And the third reason homeless may increase is, the report argues, that the operation of the expansion of homeless shelters through the state’s hotels indicates that the demand for housing is actually higher than anticipated.
“The operation of non-congregate emergency and transitional housing opportunities in hotels and motels, allowing for increased eligibility to emergency housing and creating a more accurate reflection of the community need,” the report states.
Minorities continue to struggle
The report has data by race, indicating that minorities continue to see higher rates of homelessness per their population. For instance, while blacks make up just 1.4% of the state’s population they represent 8.7% of the total homeless population.
For white people, the numbers are more proportional to the population, with about 90% of the state being white and they represent 86% of the homeless population.
Asians are disproportionately not homeless compared to their population. That means they make up about 1.8% of the state population but just 1.09% of the state’s homeless population.
Burlington has a $4 million plan
Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger has put forth a plan to continue to house the soon-to-be-homeless hotel occupants but it would require at least $4 million to put into action.
The plan involves converting the Zampieri state office building at 108 Cherry Street to accommodate a 50-person emergency shelter with a daytime capacity of up to 75 people.
“The city is proposing that the state fund the transformation of an under-utilized state office building at 108 Cherry St. into another low-barrier shelter that would be able to house 50 people overnight and serve others during the day with resources, food and case management. Champlain Valley Office of Economic Opportunity operates the Community Resource Center which offers similar daytime services, but already serves 160 people a day,” the Burlington Free Press reported.
Also circulating online, the Vermont Political Observer’s John Walters suggested, is too little too late: “If good sense were to prevail, legislative leaders would see the human toll of the June 1 evictions and the complete inadequacy of their appropriation and change course. Negotiate with the group of budget dissidents on a sensible housing plan.”
Michael Bielawski is a reporter for True North. Send him news tips at bielawski82@yahoo.com and follow him on Twitter @TrueNorthMikeB.
The next step is to declare an emergency and declare emient domain over private property. See what Eric Adams is doing in NYC (taking over schools) and forcing other towns to take in the “new arrivals.” Vermont is a failed State.
Proof Vermont is a failed State. A decade or more of unsustainable, unsubstantiated spending (thievery) and taxation (thievery.) All programs are failures. All policies are failures. The numbers do not lie. If one were to look at the condition of cities such as Portland, OR or San Francisco, CA – once the crown jewel cities of the West, you will see what Vermont will turn into shortly. Those cities have a population larger than the State of Vermont. The numbers do not lie – only the leadership. The implosion has begun and for those who stay, be prepared and ready to this State crater into it’s own cellar hole.
Isn’t it interesting how we’ve watched this government do all it can to make self sufficiency harder and harder–which has all been allowed over and over with votes, corruption and lousy people in control creating ridiculous laws and policy…
Because, dependent people vote for help (which creates government expansion) and are easy to control– but yet here we are, looking at their ‘results’: a large and growing population of people in failure needing complete support.
It seems to me that Vermonters need to vote differently.. because the entire system is what creates populations like this.
When schools fail, people fail.
When families fall apart, people fall apart.
When medical care isn’t good, when people don’t have access to it, they fail.
When social programs are ineffective shell operations- they don’t amount to anything for the people in need of them.
When you’ve got a system so complex that people cannot even figure out how to navigate it- then it’s really not there for the very people that need it the most.
All of this has been easy to see coming and was predicted actually..
It seems to me that rather than pay to permanently house and support these people, an army of social workers is a better investment.
Every single one of these homeless people have a mountain of problems that need to be sorted out one by one and actually solved.
People don’t just wake up one day and find themselves Homeless, it’s a process, it’s a series of events that they couldn’t solve.. and that they couldn’t is a failure of the state.
We’re all reading about test scores in schools going down the drain.. well that has an impact.
You’re looking at what schools that are focused on propaganda pushing gets you.
It gets you people that don’t have the real and true skills needed to find success in life.
It’s funny the feds under the potato head biden regime have plenty of money for the millions and millions of illegal invaders and to fight a war we have no business being in or having bio labs in their country too. Corrupt elections have very dire consequences. When we can’t afford to take care of our former military who are down on their luck we don’t deserve to have a military…
Curiously, I never see proposals to provide military camp style barracks in a location not impacting existing towns, cities and their environs to house the indigent, economically provide shelter, food and facilities, provide practical education, employment search assistance and some transportation facility, e.g. build close to an existing commuter rail line. The cost issue? What does the current mayhem cost? What is the social cost of the current situation? You can’t just “get rid” of them – they have to go somewhere, and – without the necessary support facilities – are unable to reach the bottom rung of the ladder that will enable self-support and independence.
Francisco,
You and I both know that every non-profit catering to the homeless would be at a military style barracks testing for everything under the sun. It’s fine when our military folks live with black mold and toxic water – but the homeless deserve much better – for doing nothing.
As you know, this was done via the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) back before WWII.
Those men learned skills and built critical infrastructure: roads, dams and other facilities.
It resulted in a reservoir of skilled, optimistic Americans with strong work ethics that helped enable us to win that war while keeping the essential factories humming at home. Anyone interested in a solution that works should research that program.
Providing free housing, food, medical care, phones, drug needles etc. to lay-abouts is not the answer.
If our leaders of the thirties used our modern “leaders” playbook, we would likely be speaking German today.
We may be speaking Chinese tomorrow.