This commentary is by Beth Ann Maier of Waterbury. She is a retired pediatrician, a deacon at Christ Episcopal Church in Montpelier and active in community organizing with Vermont Interfaith Action.
For at least two years, the news briefs and commentaries have repeatedly referred to the rising number of Vermonters without permanent housing as a “crisis!”. As with anything else we hear repeatedly over and over, our attention becomes dulled. In the realm of homelessness, our sensitivity became so numb that when close to 800 of our neighbors were exited from hotel shelter in June, it barely raised our eyebrows in concern.
People in their 50s and 60s with diabetes, neurologic deficits or heart conditions, began camping out in the mud and rain. It sounds like the “third world,” but that was Vermont this summer, and it continues to be Vermont this December. According to the Agency of Human Services, roughly 1,200 people remained sheltered in the hotels on July 1 — people receiving federal disability, people over 65 and families with children. According to DCF Commissioner Chris Winters, in a Nov. 15 conversation with Vermont Interfaith Action, only 760 of the 1,200 people in the “July cohort” remained in the hotels. Where did the other 440 go? Do we care?
A very small fraction went on to permanent housing. A much larger fraction left the hotels because they were unable to keep up with the truly onerous demands for recertification. I sat in an Economic Services waiting room for three hours in August to assist a friend. While there, we passed the time with five other people, all waiting a similar amount of time: a dad with an infant, a woman missing work, another who was ill and should have been in bed, one who was weary and confused with depression and dementia and one who had lost everything in the flood.
They all said the process to stay certified was so difficult they were very close to leaving hotel shelter and taking their chances camping out.
On Nov. 15, Commissioner Winters said the shelters were at capacity; there were only 250 hotel rooms available for those needing winter shelter, and the agency knew there would not be enough shelter capacity or hotel rooms for everyone currently living outside.
Now it is mid-December. It is cold with icy wind and snow. As of Dec. 15, the general assistance emergency housing rules allow people to shelter in the hotels until March 15, but do the math! There were 800 people leaving the hotels in June, almost all to live outside. Another 400 have left the hotels since July, plus the many who lost housing in the flood, and the many who have recently lost their housing due to impossible rent increases and eviction.
Many of these people are facing winter camping with serious health challenges, and there is no housing or shelter available. Several hundred are still outside. Is this a crisis? How many Vermonters living outside without shelter in the winter can we tolerate before we demand crisis action? If this were a war zone or the aftermath of a natural disaster, we would demand and expect crisis action, but this is the status quo in Vermont, and the disaster is of our own making.
Where are the heated and staffed hospital tents that were erected during the onset of Covid? Where are the heated and staffed emergency shelters that were available regionally after the flood? We need these now! We need to step up and respond as if we are each being made to sleep outside in the cold. How can we, as a people and a state, spend money on anything if we aren’t bringing our neighbors safely inside?
Once our neighbors are all in emergency shelter, what can we do to stem the rising tide of homelessness? We know that economic supports worked during Covid to make stable permanent housing possible for low-income families. We know from the 2023 Point-In-Time count that the number of families with children experiencing homelessness increased 36% when those supports were removed. If we don’t stabilize our families, the downstream costs of children living homeless will reverberate through our economy for generations.
We must continue to ramp up the construction of new and rehabilitated units of affordable housing until the rental vacancy rate reaches a target of 5 to 6%. Until that target is reached, we must place some control on rent increases or provide subsidies to cover the difference. If this doesn’t happen, we will have more and more families entering homelessness.
Over the last two years, we have pressed the administration and the legislature for a comprehensive plan that would provide stable and humane shelter for all individuals experiencing homelessness. We cannot accept that we are in December without a commitment and plan to humanely shelter everyone with the respect and care that their presence among us as valued neighbors and citizens demands. What do we value? What do we prioritize?
We are better than this! We are kinder than this! Please take the actions necessary to end this crisis!
