Police told lawmakers Wednesday that there’s an “unacceptable” amount of criminal activity in and around motels where people experiencing homelessness in Vermont are being housed during the pandemic.
Seven hotels in central Vermont are housing 254 adults and 62 children experiencing homelessness, Barre City Police Chief Timothy J. Bombardier told the House General Committee Wednesday. He said 138 of those adults have been involved with police, fire or emergency medical services while living at the hotels, and 53 have been arrested.
He said reports range from noise complaints and checks on a person’s well-being to drug sales, overdoses, assaults, prostitution, human trafficking, domestic violence, and one missing persons case from April that is “probably going to turn up to be a homicide.”
There’s so much crime, Bombardier said, that it’s adversely affecting everyone else staying at the motels. He said some motel residents have even reported being afraid to leave their rooms.
“Everyone deserves to enjoy the same peace and tranquility that we all expect when we go home,” he said. “Just because you’re homeless, that should not be taken away from you.”
In total, he said, there have been 937 calls for service during the pandemic to the seven hotels, concentrated mostly at the Hilltop Inn in Berlin, with the EconoLodge, Quality Inn and Hollow Inn also contributing.
“We understand that homeless populations will often demand more of our resources, with past legal, mental health and substance abuse issues that often led to their homelessness in the first place,” Bombardier said. “Law enforcement is doing the best we can to take care of the needs of this population, especially those with children and those living in fear of other hotel guests.”
Up until now, Bombardier said, managing the heightened crime rate at the hotels has been handled through local police departments’ regular budgets. But now, he said, the Department for Children and Families will pay for an additional 20 hours a week of police services, shared among the four local police departments in the area.
The state has been distributing grants for security coordination at these hotels since April, said Tricia Tyo, deputy commissioner of economic services with DCF. She said contracts with sheriffs were expanded in June to start “roving patrols” at many hotels, mostly in Chittenden County, where the need was greatest.
Through the summer and fall, she said, funding was expanded further, and in December, the state signed a contract with Green Mountain Concert Services to provide private security seven nights a week from 5 p.m. to 1 a.m at hotels across Vermont. In all, she said, the state has spent several million dollars increasing security presence at the sites.
“This is a population that is so preyed upon that some of the survival instincts and some of the choices they have to make are not choices that we would make,” Tyo said. “They’re not mainstream, but this is a very vulnerable population.”
She said one of the biggest ways the state helps with security is by reminding hotels that they’re allowed to not house any people who are violating rules, whether that’s by disturbing other guests or engaging in criminal acts.
People who break the rules can be kicked out for 15 or 30 days before they’re eligible for housing again (that rule doesn’t apply to adults living with children). Tyo said at any given time, about 50 individuals are on that list. Shelter leaders said sometimes, they’re able to find beds for these people, but other times, they’re only able to provide basic equipment “to protect life.”
At the beginning of the pandemic, children were spaced out among all the hotels. However, fairly early on, that became problematic, and all the children in central Vermont hotels were moved to the Hollow Inn, which is on a less busy road and has a yard. Additionally, officials say the move helped to get children away from hotels with the most concentrated crime.
Bombardier said most people living at the hotels have had prior involvement with law enforcement, and he wishes there had been more vetting before moving everyone into the motels to ensure children weren’t in danger.
“There’s not a lot of incentive to have people follow the rules in hotels,” Bombardier said. “There’s supposed to be a three-strikes-you’re-out rule, but where do you go? On the street? That’s not helping our situation in our communities, and it’s not helping these individuals either.”
Other state officials said some progress is also being made to engage in restorative justice practices at the hotels to try to solve issues, rather than going straight to the criminal justice system, though those efforts are still relatively new.
Stakeholders say the system is far from perfect, but all things considered, they think funding is being allocated well, and the hotels are on track to becoming safer.
“I actually feel pretty good about where we are in Washington Country right now with the array of coordination we have on this,” said Rick DeAngelis, executive director of Good Samaritan Haven in Barre. “Motels are not made for this long-term residency with so many people who have experienced trauma in their lives. It’s no secret that you’ll have to have a very broad and coordinated effort to support people.”
