With Vermont’s housing crisis threatening to slow down the state’s refugee resettlement efforts, agencies are asking lawmakers to help fund transitional housing for new arrivals.
Representatives from the two federally contracted agencies that resettle refugees in Vermont told lawmakers this week that transitional housing is “a critical need” for refugees coming to the state, and one that they do not have adequate funding for at a time when availability is low and costs are sky-high.
“With the pace of arrival and the current housing crisis in our state, we are not able to find permanent housing on time. And one of the things that we do not want to do is to traumatize refugees by housing them in hotels and motels with no future facilities,” Joe Wiah, director of the Ethiopian Community Development Council in Brattleboro, told the House Committee on Commerce and Economic Development on Tuesday.
The cost of housing in Chittenden County “has reached the point where we are unable to access long-term housing for new arrivals. So we are forced to place people in transitional housing,” said Amila Merdzanovic, Vermont director of the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI) in Burlington.
The two agencies, which are both scaling back their resettlement goals due to lack of housing, have asked lawmakers to provide just under $1 million to pay for transitional housing.
So far lawmakers have proved receptive — directing $671,000 to the initiative in the 2024 budget adjustment, which passed the Senate on Wednesday and is expected to come up for a vote in the House on Friday. Resettlement officials have also asked lawmakers to include $998,700 in the fiscal year 2025 budget to support transitional housing efforts.
“I think what we need to do is continue to fund the program as much as we can,” Rep. Michael Marcotte, chair of the House commerce committee, told VTDigger on Wednesday. “We need to continue to bring, add more employees to the state but still recognizing the housing issues that we have.”
The funding request is new and a result of the housing crisis, said Tracy Dolan, director of the state refugee office.
‘A win-win’
In the past 40 years, more than 10,000 refugees have been resettled in Vermont, said Merdzanovic, who is one herself. She came from Bosnia in 1995, started as a case worker and is coming up on a decade working to resettle refugees through USCRI.
“So people from all corners of the globe have been resettled and call Vermont home today,” she said.
Until 2017, Vermont was welcoming 300 to 350 refugees. But that number drastically dropped due to Trump administration policies, she said. Resettlement agencies have, in the last two years, been working to rebuild the infrastructure and conditions that will allow them to bring back those numbers.
Last year, Vermont resettled about 280 people in Chittenden County and also received many Afghans and Ukrainians through various humanitarian efforts, Merdzanovic said. This fiscal year, the agencies are looking to resettle more than 500 refugees statewide, the largest number in almost a decade.
But, finding housing for them is increasingly a barrier.
In Chittenden County, Merdzanovic told lawmakers, there are eight transitional housing units available for refugees through a recent partnership with the Champlain Housing Trust. But with 28 families currently in temporary housing, that doesn’t meet the need.
The Champlain Housing units cost about $50 per night for a one-bedroom apartment, but the majority of refugees in transitional housing are staying in a South Burlington hotel that charges a discounted rate of $99-$129 a night, she said. Last summer, she noted, the agency could not even access hotel rooms due to the tourist season and were forced to house refugees at Airbnbs for as much as $300 a night.
Vermont’s resettlement agencies do not receive any state or federal funding to pay for transitional housing. The one-time federal allocation of $1,325 per person that was once used to cover security deposits and initial food and utility costs doesn’t get families being resettled very far, the agency directors said. Case workers also help refugees access other opportunities such as affordable housing opportunities and rental vouchers, but all of those involve lengthy wait times.
“There is no other funding from the federal government or the state in support of transitional housing for refugees,” said Merdzanovic, except for some “very limited, very short-term” funding to house Afghan and Ukrainian asylum seekers.
Both agencies spoke to the success of the state’s resettlement efforts.
Wiah said that of the 263 refugees resettled by his agency since 2021, 202 are in Brattleboro and 61 in Bennington. About 229 are adults — they range from being not very educated to being mechanics, lawyers and accountants — and more than 80% have found local employment, Wiah said.
Refugees resettled in Vermont earned an estimated $5.2 million in annual taxable wages in 2023, officials said.
Most of them rely on transitional housing while they are learning English and other workforce skills. Transitional housing also gives newcomers a little time to figure out next steps to better integrate into society, he added.
Some refugees also come from other American states, attracted by the availability of jobs, the safety and quality of life in Vermont, said Merdzanovic. The goal of the program is early self-sufficiency through employment for adults aged 18-64.
“Our data shows about 90% of people are considered self-sufficient, which means that at least one employable adult in the family has entered the workforce within six months of arrival, which is pretty remarkable,” Merdzanovic told lawmakers.
The program is working well and is “a win-win for the refugees, it’s a win for the state and a win for our employers,” Marcotte told VTDigger on Wednesday. “It’s providing a good place for the refugees to settle and it’s providing a good workforce that employers are looking for.”
While her agency is approved to receive 250 individuals in Colchester and about 50 in the Rutland area this fiscal year, Merdzanovic has asked to only take in refugees with current ties or family in Chittenden County in an effort to limit the Colchester number. As a former refugee, “this is heartbreaking,” she said, knowing that resettlement refusals can set waiting refugees back by years.
In southern Vermont, 160 refugees are projected for Brattleboro and 75 for Bennington this fiscal year. Wiah also said he has requested those numbers be reduced. The housing situation is slightly less dire there because they have space for 80 people in student dorms at the School for International Training campus in Brattleboro, according to Wiah.
But reducing the number of refugees Vermont takes in would also reduce the funding it brings in and that could seriously harm the existing infrastructure and services, the directors said.
“Refugees, we can all agree, bring great strength to our states. They enter the workforce soon after they arrive, they contribute in so many ways bringing a wealth of cultures, languages,” Merdzanovic said. She expressed gratitude to Vermont for continued support, saying, “it does take a village to resettle refugees.”
Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated the amount of funding requested by resettlement organizations and mischaracterized refugees’ economic output in 2023. A statement by Joe Wiah was also misrendered.
