[S]OUTH BURLINGTON — Many of the people who began moving into modest but newly renovated apartments this month at the former Ho Hum Motel haven’t had a place of their own in years.
One man said he hadn’t showered in 2½ months, recalled Ben Daniels, construction manager for the Beacon Apartments, as the single-story brick complex is known. Now he has his own bathroom with a shower.
The Beacon Apartments are a project of the Champlain Housing Trust, the Burlington Housing Authority and Safe Harbor, which is the Community Health Centers of Burlington’s health care program for homeless people.
The 19 studio and one-bedroom apartments on Route 7 between Burlington and Shelburne are not transitional housing, said Chris Donnelly, director of community relations for the housing trust. Tenants can stay forever if they choose, he said.
Working with United Way, the groups conducted a survey to identify the homeless people in the region most likely to die on the streets or in the woods. They’re also the people “most likely to cycle through emergency rooms,” Donnelly said — visits that ultimately drive up health care costs borne by the public at large.
The idea is to give the long-term homeless, many of whom struggle with substance abuse and mental illness, stable housing and support services that will allow them to live more normal lives.
“These are folks who have trouble navigating the system on a good day. They’ve really just been focused on survival,” said Erin Ahearn, Safe Harbor’s homeless health care program manager.
Many are the product of generational poverty and “never had the opportunity to be independent and successful on their own,” Ahearn said. They often grew up without a family home, frequently staying with friends or relatives, and in some cases on the streets, she said.
Safe Harbor has a team of caseworkers who will help tenants at the Beacon Apartments enroll in public benefit programs such as food stamps and Medicaid, or Supplemental Security Income for those with disabilities.
They’ll also provide transportation to medical appointments, employment assistance and guidance on how to be a good tenant and neighbor for people who may never have had that opportunity.
The project is modeled after the 100,000 Homes initiative, a national campaign to provide housing as a first step to ending chronic homelessness. It’s the first of its kind in Vermont, Donnelly said.
That initiative provided a “vulnerability index,” criteria to assess the needs of the area’s homeless people, allowing social workers who know them on a personal level to make objective decisions about who should get coveted slots in the permanent homes, Ahearn said.
The problem is that 19 apartments is nowhere near enough permanent housing.
“We could easily fill another Beacon tomorrow with people in as great need,” Ahearn said. The survey identified more than 60 people who met the criteria for permanent housing.
Donnelly said he, too, would like to do more similar projects, but it’s difficult to replicate the circumstances that allowed the Beacon Apartments to happen. Building new is too expensive, and it’s difficult to find properties to renovate and maintain as permanent subsidized housing.
Bill Wilson, the owner of the Ho Hum Motel, was considering retirement when he was approached by the Champlain Housing Trust. The trust was able to secure a long-term lease that gives it an option to buy the property after 15 years.
The trust received $500,000 from the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board to renovate the property. The trust didn’t take a fee and is financing a $300,000 shortfall on the project, Donnelly said. His organization is hoping to close that gap with grants from the Federal Home Loan Bank.
Tenants will pay 30 percent of their income in rent and the Burlington Housing Authority is providing vouchers that will cover the rest. CHT will use that money to pay the ongoing maintenance and property management costs.
Wilson could not be reached for an interview, but Donnelly said that, according to Wilson, the vast majority of customers at the Ho Hum were homeless people being lodged by the state due to a lack of emergency housing.
Providing emergency shelter by renting hotel rooms for the homeless is a costly practice that the state has long said it would like to end. However, there aren’t enough warming shelters or transitional housing options to curtail the program.
“Nobody likes it. It’s just a way to keep people from freezing to death,” Donnelly said.
Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated how tenants rent is covered.
