 Welcome everybody. This is Friday noon meeting of the general housing and military affairs committee and we're going to pick up a conversation we started on Tuesday which is to really address the future of housing starting with housing the homeless and the people who have been homeless before this situation we have done this administration and the advocates have done yeoman work and getting 1700 people or so who have been homeless who were homeless at the time of this pandemic in the emergency period to get them into housing primarily in hotel rooms to get them out of congregate settings and there were some fears raised over the last couple of weeks that the stay at home order which is due to expire on May 15th may trigger something that quite frankly none of us want to see and that's every everyone we've talked to feels the same way and the commissioner shats us here to talk about the take from inside AHS and DCF so I'm going to I'm going to pass the microphone to you commissioner in in respect for not only for your position but for your time and if you could fill us in when we last spoke we were in that place of just taking that deep breath of saying oh my goodness we got this all done and we got these folks into that place and then of course I immediately turned around and said okay so now and here we are you know and I wasn't the only one but we are all in the place of okay so what's the next right thing to do so I just like to go ahead and let you start with with what's going on at AHS and share some of the thoughts that you had in the memo that you shared with us and and just just to mention to the witnesses and to committee that this hour and 45 minutes is going to go by very quickly so um so just I just want to keep that in mind I want to be respectful of people's time we have spent a lot of time in committees this week and so commissioner shats the microphone is yours thank you very much representative Stevens this is Ken shats I'm the commissioner of the department for children and families I do really appreciate the committee's time in focusing on the issue of our homeless population and how we're dealing with addressing their needs and interests in light of this pandemic it is incredibly challenging I think it has been a really positive story about the Vermont community coming together to actually do our best to address the needs of this particularly vulnerable population so I start from from that place I do want to introduce Jeffrey Pimcher who many of you know these are my senior advisor and he'll stay along on the committee rest of the committees hearing today unfortunately I will need to leave relatively soon after my testimony and finish of your questions of me we going to the point that representative Stevens mentioned as I think most of you recall and are aware we did in effect create an emergency exemption to our normal fairly restrictive rules regarding GA emergency housing in terms of motel vouchers along the lines of the all-weather conditions waiver we did this in light of COVID-19 and in light specifically of the governor's stay home stay safe order which was due to expire is due to expire technically still on May 15th and so the waiver that we issued under the formal GA program was to May 15th consistent with the governor's order but as representative Stevens indicated and we all do feel the same way we know that we don't want to have an abrupt change so to be very clear and we did send a memo to stakeholders and the committee yesterday to confirm that we are not going to close that waiver abruptly on May 15th we are going to continue to allow those who are homeless to stay in motels for the time being and as we work on and roll out a transition recovery plan which I do want to talk a little bit more about today to give you a sense of what we're thinking and talking about in terms of an approach and even process to move forward because it is not a plan written in stone it is actually at this point concepts that we want to engage you as the legislature but also our many community stakeholders to discuss to make sure that we are doing the best we can to make this transition that is going to be important and so let me start by talking about the fact that we you know we do feel good about the fact that as a state we did effectively implement advice and recommendation from the CDC from our own Department of Health with respect to slowing the spread and of the outbreak of the virus particularly with respect to the population of people who are homeless and frankly good news is that as of today I am not aware of any Vermonters who are experiencing homelessness who have tested positive for COVID-19 that certainly may happen it's not as if the zero number is in effect forever but the point is we have been successful in protecting this vulnerable population something I think again as a community I think we can all be proud of we know we want to get people into stable safe housing that's certainly something we've all been working on for years and we needed to move quickly again as the chair indicated in terms of we had an approach that utilized shelters in a very significant way that is an approach that we felt made a lot more sense than having people in numerous hotels all over the state COVID-19 has certainly changed that but we want to get back to over the next nine to 12 months if possible as an approach that does recognize the need for stable housing that does not over utilize motels as a stop gap solution for people who need emergency housing so we're going to look at a phased approach to reducing the numbers of Vermonters in hotels as the chair indicated you know we're actually close to 1800 people in motels as we sit here today including over 250 children a situation that is good to protect people for the time being under COVID-19 and the fact they're homeless but it's not a long-term strategy we know we're going to provide support for shelters to enable them to start up again they'll have to do that consistent with a health department guidance we know that they may need some additional support and technical assistance to enable them to reopen that's certainly something that we are talking about in addition broadly speaking I will say we also know and this is where the legislature I'm hopeful will be a partner we're going to need some new investments we're going to have to recognize that there is a need for a supportive housing in a variety of ways we need to be thoughtful about what services really need to be provided really need to be provided for this population and that includes services with respect to mental health, substance abuse and other issues that this population faces we're clearly going to need some financial assistance in terms of rental assistance for this group of folks and obviously the availability of actual affordable rental units is a key part of this challenge so we're going to work on all those things and that's as we go forward again we want to recognize that what we did is unravel the system that we had in place which as I said indicated which was reliant to a significant degree on shelters we've had to reduce the population shelters many of them have closed some have stayed open but with reduced numbers of people there to be consistent with health department advice and that's clearly important to recognize that those shelter providers are doing what we've asked of them they have in fact stepped up and continue to provide support for some of this population in the motels that they're now placed in so so that is greatly appreciated I do also want to mention this I think you know that we did work with the state emergency operation center to look at the need for isolation and recovery sites and again with respect to the homeless population that we were very well aware they did not have a home to go back to to stay safe and so we did identify heart replace and initially the holiday in as isolation and recovery centers um Goddard was talked about as a recovery center a tremendous amount of work was done by uh community providers by state officials to get those facilities ready in case we needed them the reality is and this is again good news we have not needed them to any great degree we have a small number of people in harbor place and holidays we speak we are um no longer planning for the time being to use Goddard as a site for recovery but this is all good news and I just want to emphasize to the committee that from our perspective um this was really important work to be done it was not wasted effort we did not know six weeks ago what we were really looking at in terms of the impacts of the pandemic so the amount of work that folks did um is greatly appreciated even if the utilization has been relatively low that's a again that's a positive and so again with respect to the particular program that DCF runs the general assistance emergency housing program we did first quickly recognize that they were very highly vulnerable people in shelters and so we moved those folks out very quickly to keep them safe and get them out of the congregate facilities and then we moved into this more general waiver of normal GA emergency housing eligibility rules and again as I indicated earlier we intend to extend that beyond May 15 we don't have a date certain at this point and frankly I want to be flexible I want to make sure that we do this in a way consistent with a plan to transition folks to safe housing and so that's what I'm going to talk about now the thoughts the numbers a little bit and the thoughts we have going forward and so to give you a sense of the of the scope we currently have approximately 160 households continuing in shelters around the state that's 58 percent less than usual so it's a substantial reduction and again as I indicated earlier that's because those shelters complied with the advice and recommendations of our health department and DCF so they're doing what we asked of them and we appreciate that but on the other hand we have approximately 1400 a little bit less than 1400 households in motels that's over 400 percent of what we saw last year so you can see in turn to those numbers and the scope the the significant changes that we've seen we're looking at 156 households with children um approximately 1200 households without children um it which gets over 1800 people in motels including as I said over 250 children these are really big numbers and you know we've struggled with this issue about how to count who's homeless in the past and in some respects this is an indication that the numbers at least in my mind are are substantially higher than for example the point in time approach and we always knew the point in time approach was not a totally accurate count but this gives you a sense that whereas in january the point in time count indicated approximately 1100 people who are homeless we're now talking 2000 or more and so it gives you a sense of the scope of the problem which is really important to understand it also includes because this includes a significant number of people who are precariously housed that is some of these people who are now in motels were people who were doubling or tripling up with family members or friends in in situations that um may have been short term and may have sufficed but in light of the pandemic they needed to get out they needed to separate and so it's reflective again of the population that we need to understand is in fact seriously homeless or precariously housed so they come within that category the reality here is that COVID-19 even though we're doing really well as a state and and even nationally we're certainly improving but it's not gone we are going to have to recognize it will be with us for a while so for example with respect to shelters we cannot just turn around and say shelters can go back to doing business the way they did they will have to reduce their capacity to be consistent with health department guidelines in terms of physical distancing even as the impact of the pandemic decreases so this is a long-term problem is my point it's not like it's over on some day certain so looking at this we do recognize that this is a substantial number of people in motels we know eventually that the tourist industry will start to come back and so the availability of these motels will actually go away to a certain extent so we need to again we can't just assume we can maintain people in these same motels going forward we are going to have to adjust and we're going to have to pivot and so we're trying to again um do that in a thoughtful way to that end we're looking 12 to 15 months out to address this situation and what we are talking about is a combination of short medium and long-term strategies to address this situation by short term I'm talking about the next three months between now and July what we want to take advantage of and is the coordinated entry system that you I think are aware of we can certainly respond to questions but we have implemented that around the state we need to now with these additional people in motels do a lot of hard work with our community providers to actually enter the data regarding the status of these people and also frankly analyze it and understand it better to make sure that we are providing the appropriate interventions needed by individuals and families who are homeless and so we're going to need to increase our case management services for this population we know that we know that that they're in this situation because they do need additional supports in terms of navigating our housing arena and we need to provide that level of support and and similarly with respect to mental health and substance abuse services we need to provide those and frankly we're doing that now in many areas of the state as we look to the next even three months and more and while people are still in motels we're hopeful to continue to enhance that level of support to address the needs of the population who's there now and at least for the next three months are unlikely to move quickly but on the other hand during this transition period we are also looking at moving people out of these motels to a certain extent we may look for other temporary sites like other motels that are not likely to regain usage during the rejuvenation of the tourist industry that is we know around the state there's a few motels that may be able to be leased and we can move people into those for a longer period of time without being subject to a week-to-week kind of situation so we're looking and working with community partners about the potential in various parts of the state to move people into leased motel type situations as a transition phase again with respect to shelters we do think that we can move some people back into shelters albeit with reduced capacity and so we're hopeful even to a small degree too there are some people who have relatively short-term needs that we can move out into the existing rental unit capacity that does exist our non-profit profit housing providers do have some vacancies we're going to work with them to try to support moving some of these homeless people into those vacant units similarly with respect to the private rental market there are some people who maybe we can move out relatively quickly but it also moves into kind of the more medium-term efforts that we know will take longer and will require some more substantial effort and that does relate to securing new resources and again you'll be a major player in that discussion and those decisions so to the extent we need to enhance our housing navigation and retention services that's going to cost some money and we're going to hopefully be able to use some federal funds for that but and we're working on trying to identify those costs and we'll be coming back to you later with respect to potential asks but please be prepared for those questions coming your way or requests I should say coming your way with respect to resources similarly we're going to work with our providers to identify what both non-profit providers and private market providers what units can we access relatively quickly and to that end we'll use programs like for modern rail subsidy and other rental assistance approaches recognizing that some of these individual and family simply can't afford the going rate for rental units and they'll need some additional support to move into stable units we ate the agency on commerce and community development and you may have heard from them already is certainly aware of the fact that there's a portion of our housing stock that simply needs substantial work to be ready and for people to move in and so we're certainly talking with them about a rental rehabilitation program to fix up some of those units to enable people to actually take advantage of them we also recognize that individuals need not only short term assistance but some of this population really needs ongoing permanent support and so we need to recognize that a permanent supportive housing approach is clearly necessary and one aspect of this plan that we want to look at what's the level of funding that's really necessary to provide those supportive services on an ongoing basis the other item that I would mention is of course something that you as a legislator have already addressed and and that's the eviction prevention arena I even take some steps in from my perspective I appreciate that on the short term with respect to COVID-19 but we're going to talk about this within the context of a longer plan to pry to provide some support to prevent eviction and again that obviously has some financial impact to be sure but we want to reduce the number of new individuals and families becoming homeless by preventing evictions and then finally one of the most challenging of course is just increasing the affordable housing stock and honestly we know that's a long-term approach that does involve again the legislature the Vermont Housing Conservation Board and other partners but clearly as we look at these numbers of people in motels who are homeless and then turn and look to the housing market we know we need increased capacity of affordable housing so this is kind of an overall concept plan that we are talking about we wanted to check in with you to see if you think we're on the right track what we plan to do is going forward is work more specifically with community partners frankly with the agency of human services with ACCD with the agency of administration to come forward with more specific plans we do look at this as a partnership both with the legislature with the administration and our community providers we know we need to develop a budget and and give you some more specific information and we're working on that and we expect to come forward with more specific proposals in that regard in the near future so let me stop and offer myself up for you to give me your questions and comments one quick one for me just to start can we've been asked by the hcb as a representative of greater number of stakeholders to ask them to convene kind of a task force that would that kind of sounds like it would fit hand in glove with what you're planning is that something that you've heard about or talked about and is that something that you would welcome and certainly welcome it what's interesting to me in this world and there's others who are more knowledgeable we have a variety of committees coalitions that meet and my only comment would be rather than creating something new does it make sense to charge one of the existing bodies to do this work but i'm open to whatever approach but i do agree that there are a variety of partners that need to put their heads together and work collaboratively and an integrated and work in an integrated way to move us forward so whatever form that takes is frankly fine with me no that's fine i mean i mean what you testified the way you testify you sounds like you've been in our committee for 10 years so um i mean these are all outcomes that we would like to see you know that we've all been um discussing um but for the normal legislative and appropriations process so i think that we already have a leg up in least in terms of what we want to do it's just a question of having to get there um representative triano you're you're good we can hear you i am so um just a few questions Ken um do we have um a handle on in numbers um who are episodic homeless who are chronic um how many are individuals are we providing services to to keep them in place um and what's the approximate cost of an annual cost of services for someone with mental health issues let's say who has been placed in harbor place and continues to get services in order to be able to integrate into the the new house so let me try to answer your questions and and i may duck on some of them but we do have some we do have some information certainly about the population we're serving this is what the coordinated entry system had uh has provided us so i can tell you in a summary fashion that we know about 25 percent of the population of homeless people really have short term needs that we think that um they they're relatively discrete a lot of them are financial but um it's short term that we know that there's about 45 percent of this population have what we're describing as moderate needs um they need more support to make the uh step to affordable housing uh and and it does require more a higher level of services including housing navigation and support including some mental health and um substance abuse and then but but once we and that's what for example the family supportive housing program that is some of you know there's already a program within dcf certainly um does i think in in a in a very um successful manner but then we have what we refer to as the highest need about of about 30 percent of this population in my mind sometimes that's referred to as the chronic homelessness um category that is these are people that i was referring to earlier that i think we need to recognize and accept they have challenges and issues that are simply not going to go away they are permanent and so we will simply need to acknowledge that we need to provide permanent supportive housing for that population um over time you know with respect to the the um the uh cost and and numbers honestly i don't have a great handle on that i think that others may be more knowledgeable than me to be sure but we do things now in a way that um does have admittedly silos so that um you know the dcf emergency housing program serves people who come into our program because they're literally um no place to to shelter no money to do anything else and we provide services but at the same time the department of mental health and through the designated agencies provides a lot of support to that population the department of mental health has its own housing assistance program that it provides both for short term and longer term housing you can talk about the department of corrections too is a major player here in terms of reentry they provide a lot of housing support that also can include supportive services for people leaving the prison system so it's a fairly complicated system and going to the the point that the chair made about a task force i am hopeful that as we go forward will will do better at really pulling these pieces together in an integrated way and then frankly might also do better at identifying the actual cost that is involved in providing the appropriate level of services so just a quick follow-up do we know if we round it up many of the uh what i would call what i would be calling chronic homeless i mean have we brought in the 10th dwellers from outside of burlington into into this number of 1800 housed in motels at this point do we have any notion as to that so i'll respond based on my knowledge but again others may have more specific on the ground knowledge but i think to a certain extent the answer is yes but i don't want to say 100 i think that what we've seen for example you know in burlington was a very specific strategy when the warming shelter closed in burlington because related to cobit 19 there was a very thoughtful approach that they could have closed some of those people might have moved into the existing ga program and into motels but instead the community there working with the state identified that we want to enable those people to be sheltered rather than going into tents encampments and so as you may know the state least trailers the city worked with us very closely and the community providers to move those trailers to the north beach campground in burlington and from my perspective that was very definitely an approach to avoid having those people simply go into tent encampments instead i think we're providing better support in that arena and i think the openness to using motels around the state similarly has enabled people to be comfortable moving into those settings as opposed to staying intent intense outstanding if if i if i'm gonna add um um to your questions representing Toronto i think this is it's worth reiterating that this despite the traumatic events that we have found ourselves in this is an astounding opportunity for us as a system of care because we have an enormous number of folks in motels at this moment in time and we can use things like coordinated entry to conduct the the necessary assessments to be able to put real numbers to what you're asking and i think our community partners are doing an incredible job of reaching out to folks in motels and trying to get as much of that information as possible many of those folks that we are housing are currently in the system in coordinated entry already but there is a significant swath that is not and so we're working very quickly to get those folks into the system and assess that we understand that we need a lot darker representative clacky commissioner thank you so much i have to i'm very grateful for everything you and your team have done it's pretty extraordinary and i just have a few questions to make sure i understand this phased approach over the next three months so the hotel vouchers will some of them will be phased in and stay and others will be transitioned and you said a case management will also be provided for these individuals will the food that's being delivered to their hotel rooms every day will that continue over this phase approach as well yes it is that we do have a system to make sure consistent again with the health department guidance that we limit the exposure so at least for the time being we will continue to deliver food you know depending on how progress goes with respect to addressing the pandemic and the governor and the department of mental health guidance with respect to continuing contacts in communities certainly that might evolve over time but for the time being we are continuing to provide food to people in shelters and again many in many respects again a tremendous compliment to the people in our community both our formal community providers but also a vast array of volunteers all over the state we're helping out and then my second and last question is in in south burlington where i am the the holiday in was a backup and from our city manager now we're not going to need that is that correct or how many people are currently there and are you transitioning them out of that hotel so i what i will tell you is there's only a handful of people at the holiday in as we speak and again as i indicated earlier that's really good news i know there's conversations going right i mean we also need to appreciate that i know there's conversations going on about the future use of the holiday and that is happening more directly from the state emergency operation center so i actually don't know the answer to that question as we speak i think it is currently being discussed and considered so i don't know what the future of the holiday in is thank you all right representative walls and then thank you thank you commissioner i i had to really leave the room briefly while you were talking and i apologize if i missed this and you already addressed it but i'm sure uh what i'm thinking about is has occurred to other folks and we may have the opportunity here to address a couple of issues uh i was prompted by the new story this morning that green mountain college campus is going on auction and considering the the issues we have at northern vermont university at johnson linden i wonder if there's an opportunity there to perhaps repurpose some of those facilities and in the case of northern vermont university perhaps help them stay open and and and find a way to accommodate more of the homeless i i want to be careful to stay in my lane in terms of not talking about the future of the state college system but having said that i want to be a little careful um but but but the but i do appreciate the point of as we look at the need uh to address the capacity challenges that we have we do need to look at those available properties and sites around the state to see what appropriate uses can be made although i can't also resist mentioning i also want to be careful we learned some lessons in the 60s and 70s about creation of housing for low-income populations we don't want to create ghettos of low-income housing and i know that's not what you meant but i do just want to be careful that we all recognize that to the extent we're going to expand capacity my personal view is i think we need to look at mixed income housing to make sure that we don't put people in a situation where there's added stigma based on where they're living totally agree with that thank you one of the things that popped up in the last conversation was oh there might be a nursing home available here or there which to me is quasi congregate housing i mean in across the country we've seen where that may not be the best idea either but at least it's out there for discussion um so representative Haas is here again we had kept an open invitation to members from the health um and human service or the human services committee from next door to us and i see that we have um representative Haas and representative wood has joined us as well so welcome to house general and um please microphones yours sandy thank you very much commissioner um i want to commend you on on what you've done during during the crisis and um and on what i what i consider is an excellent plan for next steps um i went through your memo um that you submitted yesterday and my only question my only comment is that your last bullet point um talk commits to giving partners and clients ample notice of any changes uh to policy um i would like you to add the legislature to the list of people who are kept informed of where you're going because uh we would like to know what's going on we're going to hear from our constituents and um it's always nicer to hear from you than in the news glad to do that i appreciate the compliment also and let me be clear that it's not me who deserves that it's it's people like jeffrey pippinger and um uh um sean brown our deputy commissioner for economic services division um and um uh sarah and others in oeo who have done a tremendous amount of work uh along with our community providers so it really has been a team effort thank you and we will keep the legislature informed representative consulates thank you so much uh so just to be clear in terms of the the path moving forward and new cases and new folks that need housing and how uh i've heard very loud and clear that there is no plan to immediately kick people out however just thinking about that um in the short term i heard lots of long-term plans and thinking about the different ways that um you're gonna that you're proposing to accommodate and make changes that we've needed regardless of this crisis and that it's an opportunity to do so but just wanted to to make sure that i have clarity on what you're thinking for folks in the next three months who are new cases and have have a need for a hotel room um we're still going to want to provide shelter to people who are homeless um and so again over time as we um do figure out an appropriate way to reinvigorate our shelter system and also create alternative sites will the bottom line is if people are homeless we want to provide them with shelter that's not going to change um and and so we're certainly not going to close any doors great and then i have a um an additional question that's not a follow-up to that um but i appreciate that clarity um last time that um you were with us i asked about translation services and and um specifically folks that are uh precariously housed that are farm workers and and potentially need to have greater social distancing to for their own health and others uh and then also generally translation services and and wondering if you've given either of those two issues any more um thoughts or work towards so i i will have to get back to you specifically and um i don't know i know we've talked about it i did appreciate your question and we've certainly talked about it and i'll check in to determine and i'll get back to you directly about what services are being provided although i will also add that one of the things that i'm looking to looking at some of the national information with respect to the population we're serving it will be interesting to see uh what portion of the population here in vermont um does uh have english has a new language uh what percentage are people of color new americans to understand as we try to address needs of the homeless population where did some of those other issues fit in so thank you for asking i look forward to hearing that thank you and representative hango thank you um commissioner the last time you were in i asked a little bit about this but you just brought up the um general assistance program um the restructuring of the emergency solutions grant that was pushed off um timeline to april 2021 i think are you still thinking of going to that model in light of everything that's changing right now so the fiskier 21 budget proposal as you indicated did include a proposal to restructure the emergency housing program i don't know what's going on with the fiskier 21 budget to be straightforward about it but with respect to the community's role in implementing um an approach to address emergency housing the plan that we're talking about is actually consistent with the approach of giving communities um resources and flexibility to address the needs of homeless in their communities so it may look a little differently because the emergency housing program may look very different as we go forward so the the perspective of giving communities um flexibility and resources is very much still in our minds so if i can follow up thank you for that i'm trying to envision this in my mind perhaps the state somehow purchases a property for instance and it resides in let's say the community of south burlington because representative callacchi um reminds us that the holiday in is vacant now or will be soon so then the community partners in south burlington would then administer the program that's going to reside in that now state-owned for instance i'm conjecturing state-owned holiday in property so that's one potential model another potential model is actually it's not the state that buys or purchases a property but it is a local housing provider or a housing entity in a community that buys or leases a property like that and the state's role is to provide the funding to help support that effort until it's not a state-run facility okay so just to follow up very briefly so then the state would um send in the mental health workers and provide for their salaries and other community support type folks again our system is actually not so much state provision of those services and i know that mary multon is is uh it on the zoom lens here so she's much more knowledgeable than me but we have a designated agency system where the state provides resources to designated agencies who provide those services it's not actually state employees who do that but that's i mean i do appreciate the questions because that is part of this conversation to go forward to figure out which roles are served directly by state entities or employees and which ones are more community based and and that is uh really important to think about with respect to addressing the needs of homeless persons in our communities thank you that's great that closed the loop for me thank you very much welcome sorry mary i sort of pushed that over to you but i know you will handle it very well um okay commissioner it is according to my clock five months so i want you to take off and go to the next spot um jeffrey i wanted to ask you a very question i just want to be mindful of the time it's almost one o'clock and we still have i still would like to hear from mary and from airheart and from um we have steven wittaker also who wanted to share some thoughts jeffrey are you here to listen do you have more to share um before we get to mary you can unmute yourself there yeah i will be here for the duration um my only uh addition uh thank you for the invitation to comment and thank you and thank you ken please feel free to we'll treat jeffrey we'll we'll treat jeffrey well thank you i appreciate that i am going to sign off thank you all bye now oh and um the thought that i had represented students was simply that um a couple of very brief things one is that um and i know that you've heard this in many different ways over the last week from different folks but i do think that we have an opportunity here um to really look going forward and not just default to returning to how we've always done things and these sorts of opportunities come around very infrequently instead of being able to capitalize on the crisis not to be so crass but to be able to re-envision things and how we deliver services to folks is critical while we are thinking about those strategies those short medium and long-term strategies i think it's also imperative that we that we do that in a very thoughtful way and in conversation with various partners within state government and outside of state government because we don't want to have a crisis like knee jerk response in the recovery that then hamstrings us down the road right and we're stuck with a certain model that might have been expedient but is not what we know is best practice and then the last piece that i would say is just that i think that you've heard this before this week as well is that we don't necessarily need to reinvent the wheel in terms of planning and conversations about you know what's best because we know what the evidence-based practices are we have the roadmap we have other efforts in terms of land now and that's fair enough and i think that um i think from my perspective a little bit is is you know what opportunities can we take advantage of but i'm also wary of saying well if we make these and i'm this may dovetail with what you're saying is that is that in the end we have to be able to afford going down the line um you know there's the infamous case of the swimming pool at white river it was a gift to the community but it ended up cost it cost the community every year because they have to provide those services and i know that the administration has expressed that kind of awareness also like what money can be used from the cares act or any other money that can be used for these purposes so it's a lot of thinking and a lot of sorting out i think we have answers to a large degree but it's going to be implementing them or coming to you know deciding what we can do so thank you for coming and thank you for you know just and if you do have um comments that you want to make please feel free to raise your hand um throughout the the rest of the meeting we'd appreciate it thank you much i appreciate that and i'll pop over to mary moulton mary is um with washington county mental health service mary served within the government for years and years um and without the government throughout the with washington county um mary we heard um just through the great vine this was over two weeks ago now that uh on one hand um there's been a because people have been housed and people have been some of the most fragile folks in in vermont that they're not utilizing some of the emergency psych services that they had prior but that's not the end of the story and i just wanted to you know wanted you to share what the what you've seen and then what you can what you see in the near future um to help us with our planning thank you thank you representative steven so for the record i'm mary moulton the executive director at washington county and um really appreciate being able to come and talk to this subject um what i heard from ken was really reassuring frankly i think we are um actually singing the same tune and uh in proving my testimony together for today you'll hear some of the same strains i think from our region around thoughts we have for putting um short mid and long term solutions in place that are somewhat in line so what what i will talk about absolutely in answer to your question um is uh our experience and um i am speaking when i say our of a really great group of community providers uh washington county mental health is only one of many that have come together to work on this in our region and we're really um very united in developing homeless housing solutions for people who are homeless so we were in this from the beginning and providing services from washington county mental health and and providing services through capstone and food and talking about what our solutions might be going forward um but uh in getting people into the hotels there was certainly um a surge there within the hotels and with that um we learned a lot about what we would need to do going forward and so uh with moving the shelter the good samaritan shelter to the akana lodge where people had individual rooms and some of them going to the hilltop in berlin with other folks that were not involved in the shelter what we learned there was that there really is a kind of need for um for some kind of understanding around ground rules and expectations on upon occupancy it wasn't all pretty that's for sure and we wouldn't expect it to be so um we uh have been fortunate uh in the last month uh working with the state to get some security beyond sight in those regions uh in those areas and uh where we have the shelter we have 24 seven staff we have support there we have mental health that goes there and and offers up services during the day just as present for people to come out and talk and forget some support if they if they want it um and at the hilltop now there is security there have been there have been some unfortunate incidents there around uh you know assault and um you know drug dealing and um there's there's a lot of there's a lot of rumor mill around what goes on up there but um overall I mean I think I know here that you know sue minter who is the executive director of capstone had said to me where do you think that the fact that we housed and fed these people kept them out of the hospital now that's something we have you know we're asking ourselves and I said well that's a variable and there are a lot of people working on that but I thought about it a little bit and I think having been a crisis responder and my background uh in crisis management what we know about when there's a major event and a disaster is that people really comply for a time and they settle down and there's a lull and so yes we housed people and we gave them food and brought them in and they felt safe and they were brought in out of the elements and we have learned so much from this experience that overall it was a very good thing that we did it um and uh then now you you know you kind of put the general stress that people have on that in any disaster and then you put COVID-19 over it and over time you begin to see situations pop and so now we are seeing people come into the ER and they are they are expressing these are people who live in the settings of the hotels that they're feeling a lot of stress that um that you know they they can't they really want a housing solution soon that they really need more support uh we had three people come into the weekend into the ER over the weekend whose anxiety level was high whose fear level was high there's there's um you know there's noise at the hotel there's a lot going on there that they're very afraid of so um you know I there is security at now at the hilltop and that is extremely helpful even coming into the building I think we're getting a handle on it that's the good news I really think we're getting a better handle on it but in any of these situations you're going to have people come in who you know are perpetrators and those who are victims and that's what we have to be present for to help mitigate when we take the responsibility of bringing folks in like this so we learned that and um just wanted to share with you a few statistics around how this has affects affects us all because you know are having to shelter in place let's face that I'm looking at you all in your your homes or your offices and um you know having been told that we must stay in these places uh makes it more stressful and for some distrustful so during this time we have had in the United States 45 percent of the adult population say that the pandemic has affected their mental health 45 percent and 19 percent says say that it has had a major impact on them that's from a Kaiser Family Foundation pool express scripts which is software for all psychiatric prescriptions reports that between February and March it's tracking mechanisms for prescription show to spike for anti anxiety medications of 34 percent 34 percent 18.6 percent for antidepressants 14.8 percent for anti insomnia medications I've talked to a lot of people who are you know taking melatonin to help themselves get to sleep um and uh Niels Poles reported that alcohol sales went up 55 percent in the first two weeks of March so my point is that within the general population this is happening and then we have specialized subsets of folks that are having even harder times and these are some of the folks that we are trying to help within the shelters so what we want to do is move toward healthy living situations where we are moving folks out of the hotels in a thoughtful fashion based on what we have learned so that we can get them the proper supports and in our region we are really solidly thinking about that and how we do it so we've thought about short mid and long-term solutions and what I would share with you is our numbers here as well as our thoughts which again align very much with Commissioner Schatz for short term securing temporary housing we think of it as securing temporary housing and safety and we were very worried about that May 15th date so a little more relaxed about that knowing that that's not going to be a you must leave hard stop you must leave the hotel but we were looking toward some level of single room occupancy units for shelter guests currently housed at the Econolodge in Montpelier with the small spillover at the hilltop and our shelter director had been very clear that he wanted to continue 24-7 of course on-site supports and those are now awake on-site supports by the way they used to sleep at night no longer they're awake and we as a mental health agency have provided folks there with training on how to assist people having a difficult time as well so and and we could look at one representative had that idea around I think it was you Tommy maybe the colleges so we look a college with open suites or rooms might be a consideration for stepping down the Econolodge for short term if we must move ourselves back we have 147 households here in central Vermont without children living in hotels there are 236 people total within the 236 are 44 children living with their parents in hotels we know currently that there are 93 households with no income except $53 of monthly GA and 46 have SSI SSDI Social Security and there's a number with no benefits at all so so our region is applying for two hop grants housing opportunity grants one is to help the shelter with this movement and to pay for what we might need to do moving folks perhaps again perhaps I want to stay in my lane to to a college dorm situation or sweet situation another is to go back to the shelter the two shelters and reduce that footprint because we know that it can't be as big as it was so when the time comes bringing a smaller group back there within one of the hop grants hiring another case manager who can work with finding people more permanent housing solutions we have found that those folks are absolutely key to helping people maneuver the system they're they're miracle workers maintaining the housing vouchers yes please in spite of all the good the bad the ugly we we need some more time and we absolutely Jeffrey I couldn't agree with you more find this an incredible opportunity for ourselves we actually know who these folks are because we are doing outreach and assessments to every single room currently between capstone and washington county mental health we have a mental health clinician clinician as I said for consultation we are able to mitigate situations where people are having a difficult time thinking they might need to go to the ER get them into a an emergency appointment we're doing that so we want to we want to continue with those supports prioritizing families with children for permanent housing with vouchers and we need more vouchers and we also realize some people will go back outside we think in our region here we didn't have everyone come in we do a street outreach team we think there's 10 to 15 people who are still out and if those are folks are going to leave the hotels and go back out we we we realize we need a little budget to help them to have proper equipment and to keep warm and safe outside midterm we kind of typify this area as securing funding planning and available housing so we move toward that we hope we hope there'd be an extension of existing hotel housing vouchers and I think that's probably the what it can refer to that for that's the maybe the eviction prevention piece where we really want to see people who face eviction be able to have that taken out off their off their plate and certainly ours as a community we do not want to add to the numbers I just gave you more people I think we all we all understand that so you know an example we have we have we have when we also want more flexibility continued flexibility with being able to help people to solve their problems and not just go toward eviction and then start that cycle and not be able to get back in to get housing right now we were working with a mom who has four children and she's kind of blown it in the area of reach up requirements but she's back engaged yet she is way behind in her rent if we can't get dollars for her you know she might lose her housing and we she's re-engaged with case management so we're just trying to get things back on track and would like to have some continued flexibility to help her more project base vouchers within the state affordable housing system and then of course you know the commissioner mentioned this just locating housing stock we need affordable housing stock and additional dollars that enhanced dollar to meet the rent that's falling just outside of price range and we talked about this a lot you can't just a bundle of money for repairs to help landlords to fix things to open up their units they've closed units to us and so we need to open those back up and if we could assure them in some cases we can because we have bundles of money but we need more in our region that we could have money for repairs in case there's something that's destroyed within their units it would be very very helpful we're working with a washington county's very invested you're very invested at within mental health at developing housing stock for folks because we believe that if people are housed overall with the supports that they need it just helps their mental health get some back on track helps their health we all know that so we're helping a new land landowner a young fella who really wants to fix up a house and we're trying to get some money out to him to develop an SRO but in a peer support person I can't say enough about peer supports as supports within some of these I would call them maybe progressive housing models where we could think forward to and we run some of these at washington county mental health you know there's someone on site 24 seven but then there's also individual apartments and so you might need that on site single room occupancy and then next to that might be an apartment that is independent and we have one of these in waterberry where we have six units and one is 24 seven wrap and then people live independently because they do better and they want to live independently but they also find it helpful to just be able to reach back and then after a couple years they're out on their own which is great that's what we hope for them long term just securing permanent housing for all and that's that's the apartment or small dwelling single units double units families the 44 kids that we have living in hotels should be a priority as I said the tiny house idea I think Eileen Peltier who's testified before you caused them now the tiny tiny might houses or something like that but we have that we have people in our one and then a peer support program next door we're housing three people now and they are very it's very successful the the tiny house mini project at this point in time is a very successful and these are hard to house chronic homeless folks so doing very well with a peer support piece we should I think continue to look at whether we could do more of that in a mixed community setting essentially we're looking to be creative look for flexibility and financing I was one who came to you and talked about the emergency solutions grant with a level of skepticism I think that my concern is mainly around will we have enough dollars to do what we need and will we be supported by the state with those needs and so you know this this whole pandemic has in fact kind of pushed some of that a bit and I think maybe because there are federal dollars come in coming in it will be more helpful to find the dollars I'm not sure but if we have to put someone in for additional supports we do need additional money within our budget to do that so we have to get those dollars from the department of health or from some other entity where we work together for our accountable community for health which is called thrive in our region on this particular homeless issue we are looking to go forward with a very similar thought process as what was expressed by commissioner shats putting our heads together if we can find the dollars we have a lot of will we need the flexibility we need the dollars we've got the creativity and the willpower so with that I think we'll we I just want to thank you for the support you'll give on this and to assure you will be putting these thoughts into a letter which will go next week to the secretary as well outlining what what a lot of what I've just spoke to you about so I'll close at this point that's great Mary thank you and I think what we'll do is move on to Richard and if you were going to be here then we'll we'll save questions for you for the end if we haven't and I believe that Eileen referred to them as tiny mighty houses or tiny mighty houses yeah so Richard Williams is here Richard is testified before our committee before he is the executive director of the Vermont housing state housing authority which controls the section eight vouchers and also helps manage the statewide vouchers which were developed over the last 10 years since and this is Richard this is kind of where I want you to just give us a quick little background on the ideas that were that happened 10 it's starting 10 years ago and how it affects us now which is when the state of Vermont lost 900 to a thousand section eight vouchers so maybe if you can give us an idea of what the numbers were how many we've reclaimed and what it means moving forward in terms of developing or adding more capacity to the statewide program that already exists thank you good afternoon representatives thank you chairman Stevens for the opportunity to testify before your committee here today the some of the the part of your introduction mr chairman was you know I've been in this business for 46 years and I've you know was involved with the department of mental health many many years ago more than I would care to even think about about about developing a bridge program that actually you know got people from a temporary small assistance that department of mental health was providing to get over to the federal section eight back then we call it certificate program now we call it the voucher program so that was an initiative in the state you know going way way back and and then of course now the Vermont rental subsidy program that many folks and including Mary and Earhart that are on here today and others were very responsible and with the generous support of the Vermont legislature to fund the program I think has been very successful as you've heard some good testimony already and you'll certainly hear more coming but before you folks left town back in March 13th I think it was you know the problem was the problem that we were speaking to you back then pretty much the same problem talking about this three-legged stool that approach which is you know talks about the need for capital dollars rental assistance and basically wrap around services and more funding for you know our community partners that actually provide the services to these vulnerable populations you know the parent this pandemic thing is you know is probably the worst thing and most of us have ever experienced in our life but it but as other speakers have said it's created some opportunities for us I mean we do this point in time count every January and we all know it's flawed but it's it is really the only method we have for for guaranteeing or you know at least trying to trying to put a number on what the homeless was you know the the number that the commissioner shats throughout was was 1100 I'd be surprised if it was that low back then but but the way that count works is is I don't have the Chittenden County numbers yet I just have some rough date data on what they call balance of state and these are numbers are just one night only would for with adverse weather conditions in all counties and and those that who have not already secured other resources and so this does include the couch surfing the doubled up or for some paying for their own hotel or or having a friend or a family pay for it the 1800 that's been number has been used today currently in hotels and motels is an extremely relaxed qualification in comparison to the point in time count as I said I would be surprised that it's only 1100 because that would be only 11 more than last year's number and we've seen in the rough data I've seen as far as balance of state there's about an 80 person increased so that doesn't include Chittenden County so this year a lot of balance of state looks to appear to be around 861 last year with 780 that some of the subpopulations there that included households with children of 102 households had kids there was 787 sheltered 76 unsheltered the chronically homeless households was 100 last year this year looks like it's 139 include veterans 68 veterans 276 mental health 181 substance use disorder fleeing domestic violence 108 youth which is 24 and under including parenting with children was 68 so that's that's the numbers that we were looking at at at a one point in time in January so the opportunity we have here now is that we have a you know a really good count on what the what the homeless is in Vermont it it is obviously very terrible times that we were in but it also provides you know great opportunities here to try to develop a system you know working with the legislature working with the administration to really drill down on this we know where folks are and you've heard about the coordinated entry program this is a great opportunity to get those folks into the system and to to drill down on what their needs are and to try moving away from you know that's I think I heard someone testify I think maybe actually was Gus ceiling you know he's I believe started with the Community Action Agency in Berry in 1977 I started for Vermont State Housing Authority in 1974 so we're some of the older folks that have been around but as Gus said there wasn't any shelter aspect in so you can see what has happened you know in in a time since then you know we've developed alternatives to permanent housing and I have never been a a fan of transitional housing or shelters but it's become a I don't know if I should use this but sort of a necessary evil that's how we we needed to come up with you know solutions to try to help folks that had no housing and so that's how we sort of got there as we see through this the last six to eight weeks you know these congregate facilities are not not a good place not a healthy place for people to be living and so we need to do better but it's gonna take a lot of money and there's an opportunity for money there's lots of there's some monies on the table now and working with the administration and the in the legislature I think there's there's some systems that can be developed you know working with the community partners to help these households we're not going to do it with federal dollars because I did an inventory of what we possibly could could you know if we develop you know just targeted all the vouchers that we currently have now is that you know we only have probably maybe 150 vouchers that we could come up with now possibly and that's far short of you know the 1800 folks that are living in in the shelters or excuse me living in the hotels so there are some vacancies out there we've heard people talk about that but with that there will have to come rental assistance you know to support to support the paying the rent and there's also going to be a need for strong support services as as Mary mentioned you know with just with some of her very experience in the last few weeks putting a lot of folks into an area has just demonstrated that in my opinion that how much we need the support of our community partners out there to provide these these services so basically what it costs the through our program that we administer we spend an approximately about $8,000 a year annually for for rental subsidy to support someone that's living in a section eight housing child choice voucher unit so if you were to think that you could support say 1500 households hang on your seats here it comes about 12 million dollars worth of rental subsidies and that's just only for a year as the commissioner said that many of these folks are going you know there's different will be different scenarios for each and every one of folks but many are going to continue to need long term subsidies as you heard from Mary most of these folks have no income so that in the way the federal program works is the federal government pays more there's always a the average right now for our programs about 650 dollars is what our housing assistance payment is but that takes into consideration our units we have about over 4000 units under that particular program so that's averaged across and so that includes you know folks that are working you know so the difference between that in what the farm market rent would be for that particular unit is made up through the tenant contribution so that and I would anticipate we're going to be paying pretty much close to 100 for many of these folks for rental subsidies there are there is there's a limited number of units out there that are vacant I don't there's definitely not enough so as as the commissioner mentioned that you know long term there needs to be a development of new affordable permanent housing there's lots of people have talked about a lot of different options you know tiny homes and filling up mobile home lots and mobile home parks you know that that that's something that could be done fairly quickly there's there's a fair amount of vacancies and mobile home parks I could see where you know there could be some acquisition of mobile homes and placed on these lots we've we've heard about the motels you know the the whole motel thing has really been you know pretty devastated I would think with this with this virus I would think that the ones that are on the edge this will probably you know close your doors so there may be some opportunities but again as you've heard from other speakers is that I've lived through some of these failed failed tries by the federal government and we all can probably think of one or two around the United States we're just too many people are housed in one building you know it's we we've got to be very careful and I know nobody wants to do that but we need to be very careful that you know the support of mixed income environment for these folks we just don't want to put everybody you know as as Mary said you know some of the challenges that they have faced with working with the hotels and the population you know putting too many people in place creates issues so I think no and I know nobody wants to do that certainly nobody in your committee or nobody out here in the affordable housing community would like wants to do that but there are options and I think everything's on a table right now it's like I said it's a terrible time that we're living in but it but what a great opportunity I mean you know Earhart's been in this business is probably as long as I have and you know we've been talking about trying to come up with solutions you know for all these years and you know and it's here it's right before us it's on our plate you know this is if we can't do something now we never will be able to do that so I haven't got many more years left in this business but you know I would certainly like to see you know the support that's behind this right now is is something we need to see continue you know so you know we've got the short-term goals you know as the how to deal with with this population and you know I don't I heard a pretty large number what it costs to support people in in the in the motels in I don't know if it's an accurate number or not basis it's I heard that it was approximately three million dollars I don't know if that's true or not but so I think that we can take this money and we can redirect it and but it's going to need to support you know not just this year and you know when the federal money goes away at the end of December it's it's going to take a lot of support from our own state legislature to appropriate the money to keep these these programs going but the problem is just going to get worse because of all the lost lost jobs so we've got a lot of people out there if they're not homeless they're not far from it and it's you know losing your you know how quick do we get our economy back up in running I don't see that happening soon so I think there's going to be more and more people looking for help and you know and that's what's really scary is that we know what the population is now and but we really don't know what it's going to look like you know in 60 90 days or longer you know because you know people are getting some support now but how long would that continue Richard quick questions for clarification and I think I'm not sure if you used the phrase but or Mary used the phrase about just a reminder about project-based vouchers versus the individual vouchers now I believe all of our state issued vouchers are individual vouchers and we have project-based vouchers or something that was much more in vogue 30 years ago than it is now but they are what helps make some of this housing stable because because an individual may qualify for a voucher and then they have to find a place to live in a landlord to to find it but then if they move or including moving out of state they can take that voucher with them as long as they still qualify is that's are those still the same same rules or same definitions of the of the vouchers yeah the you know that the voucher is a portable voucher and it's not just not limited to the state of Vermont but you mentioned family unification excuse me you mentioned the project based voucher program and that is created it's not like it's a new allocation or anything of vouchers what we do is we use our normal allocation of section 8 housing choice vouchers and we can make those into project based vouchers and we can enter into up to 20 year contracts in fact today we just released and it's up on our website we're funding 12 affordable housing projects that just went through a recent competition which is about 842 thousand dollars annually in our section 8 program budget authority so that's it's I think it's around 12 different different projects throughout the state so that that will be long term permanent affordable housing some of those went to private developer developers and but the majority even went to non-profit developers so that's great I saw that so you mentioned something about project based you know there has been some conversation and maybe Jeff Jeffrey wants to jump in or not but I think there's an opportunity to do project based subsidies through the Vermont rental subsidy program but it's going to take a guarantee and you know typically that's hard for legislature to make those guarantees going forward that you know forward funding of a program but I think that's an option too and the project based vouchers really that's what it takes to really get permanent affordable housing that's what the developers are looking for that's what many were using tax credits either state tax credits or the you know four percent or nine percent credits through Ron Helsing finance agency but the project base is what brings that was capital dollars to the project because they know that those units are going to be occupied they know that there is going to be at least 80% or more of that housing assistance payment will be paid in there in the case of the the project based vouchers the federal government but this case it could be the state of Vermont represent Triano yes I just you know I mean Ken I think it was that mentioned that some of the disastrous housing projects of the past and you know after working in St. John'sbury for 40 years I recall what used to be known as Mu Mike Ridge built far enough out of town so that you couldn't walk into downtown there was no services or facilities around it and it you know it was a disaster I mean it's it maintains it still happens but I mean it was that based on an idea that people who need services should be close together in order to consolidate the services that they need you know I just I could never quite figure out how that bad idea I guess well representative Triano you're absolutely correct and we were involved with that project when I first started in housing in 1974 and I mean I think the first time I was up there there was a deer hanging out the window I complimented the gentleman on his it was a nice nice buck but I suggested that might not be the best place to be hanging it is out of his apartment window so we also had new avenue apartments which has been a challenge for St. John'sbury another flawed program but that was the biggest challenge for that was an out-of-state owner developer of that project and there was no stewardship over that we had many challenges with that property but we wanted to keep the rental assistance in place on it as even with the challenges we had with that particular owner developer and now that's going to be under great new stewardship once we can get the construction crews back in there again that's going to be housing that you know town of St. John'sbury can be very proud of you know yes I mean most appropriate as a downtown as a downtown development piece is of great interest and I think that it will happen I think that you know in the I watched from my office window for a number of years the various owners go through and make a valued attempt at trying to fix a you know a hundred-year-old furnace and keep everyone warm and rid the bed bugs from there and things and such so I have great hope for this new project and I think it is much more appropriate for what we're trying to deal with as far as you know low moderate income in a in a even in rural communities but in the community rather than outside the community and I noted that vouchers are being transferred so that those who were displaced as a result of this project will be able to come back if they so if they want to and use those reuse those vouchers so I thought the whole thing just really came together well and I'm looking forward to revitalizing downtown both with jobs you know apartments and the commercial space which is all empty right now and has been unable to to be rented because again you know just water and sewer problems and heating problems so you know it's well needed in St. John'sburg yeah you're absolutely correct you know I think anytime you saw any flurry of activity over there is probably after a threat from my office of terminating your housing assistance payment contract and that usually got their attention but you know now you know rural edges involved with that housing Vermont's involved with that they're going to have private management once that gets up and running you know we we worked with all the residents to help relocate find them housing as you said they can come back if they choose to you know or if not but it's still there will be project-based vouchers for that and I really think in getting that commercial space back back available because you know we're a whole different times now but you know it's how are we going to you know you know support our downtown businesses that we have already in at the same time create more but it's such a great opportunity for you know some other retail space there that's just uh you know just basically it's been boarded up it's been a nice or I hated to drive by that building you know and I can imagine you folks living in the community so 12 empty uh commercial spaces uh just in the two blocks of downtown and you didn't want to go in that Chinese restaurant because they when they walked away from it they just left it the way it was so not a not a pretty site no I think it's a good point that representative is that you know it is critical to wherever this housing is built that it has access to services and not to over tax the folks that are providing the services as well because you know every you know rural Vermont or northeast kingdom you know their capacity is much different than you know you know some of these you know service agencies that are operating in Chittenden County so you know and so wherever it's wherever this is going to be you know housing is going to be built the supports need to be there and you know support's coming the way of dollars uh and that's how you know folks are able to support the staff uh that are really doing just unbelievable things out there working with with the vulnerable population we're talking about here all right thank you we were expecting another witness and we're I'm just going to give him a little bit of leeway um Stephen Whitaker who you may know wanted to testify he provided us with um he provided us with some information that is on our website right now um but he is I'm going to give him a couple minutes to see if he he was listening in on the YouTube and so Stephen if you are available please request to come into the meeting um so while we're waiting Jeffrey do you have anything that you want to share at this point from what you've been hearing no okay I mean you know the the breath of the problem or the the breath of the possible solutions is just so it is so big I mean Earhart is here but I've asked him to come back on Tuesday to not only talk about um issues that are directed directly related to the to the work that he's provided us but he's also been on top of the federal funding and trying to get an idea as much as anybody else has to try to get an idea of of how the money can be spent what's actually coming to Vermont through small state minimums as he's discussed before but also perhaps we'll have some ideas about what the larger care act is about um for us but also uh I would like to and Earhart also advocates at times for pathways we've heard from more Collins who's the chair of the board and we've also heard in the past earlier this year from Hilary Melton who is the executive director of pathways we had they had asked us for support for the expansion of pathways and to more um I believe it was going to be uh $900,000 was the request this year to expand it to two more counties Rutland and perhaps Bennington County and the pathways model is what we were the housing first model I don't think that phrase was used by the commissioner but when we're talking about what's the fastest we can get to um to the getting these services out to people pathways has shown that between the housing and the service the wraparound services that it's been very effective and cost effective as well um I'm going to is this Steven yes I'm here all right um so I'm gonna um as Steven I trust you've been listening um we it's 145 now we're gonna try to end as close to two o'clock as we can today but I wanted to give you you have you've been expressing to me offline the desire to weigh in on what you see at least here in central Vermont as some of the some of the important issues from from the folks that you know and from what so I just wanted to be able to give you an opportunity to share your thoughts with us we see we've seen um we know that there's material that you provided us that's on our website right now but um I just wanted to go ahead and pass the microphone to you if that's okay yeah that's fine thank you mr chairman um Steven Whitaker for the record uh I've been living in central Vermont for 30 some years I've worked in on and off with affordable housing and energy efficiency for some decades before that so but I think uh in timing uh is appropriate may day may day may day we this uh homeless support services system was broken before the pandemic it's worse now even as everyone is more tolerant out of necessity due to the pandemic uh the complacency the tolerance of the indignity even the cruel neglect is pervasive uh and we hear this constant refrain of everyone's doing the best we can um I suggest that I know some communities are doing what's called a sleep out for the homeless where the decision makers the policy makers the uh public officials actually experience what it's like to live on the street I've been an advocate for many issues but specifically I spent the last year working with the homeless population in uh central Vermont there were over 150 people uh last summer uh spread across outside of the shelters um and you've heard a plenty of numbers now uh but you know in order of priority I just want to kind of ground this from the folks there's a number of people who do not fit into the shelter system um I just went and talked to four or five of them this morning uh for various reasons they're either they've been banned by Good Samaritan uh they have they can't deal with that uh control paradigm uh anxiety issues over claustrophobia whatever but there's quite a few people who are not into the system and that seems to be somewhat of an ignored population uh and even more vulnerable than the ones who have hotel rooms right now but the lack of integration between uh local service providers and or even municipalities is is astounding and I've been arguing that this is a city government responsibility to keep an eye on this to have a point person to know where the meals can or can't be had uh to keep bathrooms open um the city is our capital city in Montpelier uh shirks that responsibility says we're not in the social services business somebody else will take care of it now there is there's a new you know county command center that is supposed to be taking care of it and it and nothing could be further from the truth in order of priority the needs of these folks on the street is food toilet safety privacy showers laundry restful deep sleep as opposed to being roused on a bench somewhere uh by every noise as a possible threat supplies human trusting connections to you other humans and I'm almost facetiously I put hope and plans and faith at the bottom because by the time you get to the bottom of that list there's very little left in many of these folks uh view of the world uh there's I was somewhat I was I was interested but somewhat shocked at the nonchalant manner of the witness from uh one of the white river white river valley shelters talking to the senate economic development committee yesterday on the same topic but talking about the it's okay to put these lined up cuts head to toe so they're not breathing in each other's faces yeah they might be smelling each other's feet but that that's acceptable I mean I beg to differ uh many of these folks are angry and they're acting out is to be expected uh some of their socialization skills have atrophied over time too much time on the streets and we hear this tired story that it's often their own fault it's due to mental illness the the care or matter more accurately the neglect of our society for this population is causing mental distress we're compounding the challenges and the future costs of reintegrating our brothers and sisters so yes there are unfortunate circumstances and it's a vicious cycle addiction mental challenges lack of job skills reputation but where is the transition plan we this is the real opportunity and I am hopeful that we would seize the opportunity but what I'm hearing sounds like more the same because our community partners are part of the problem the complacency the uh oh the state the state approach uh you hear it referred to the the road to end the end ending homelessness the roadmap to ending homelessness and to me it's a wish list for when a half a billion dollars becomes available there's no specifics in how to make any progress in the meantime to be holding out until there's enough money to build quarter million dollar apartments uh an unlimited supply of quarter million dollar apartments to put folks in is is an absurd is a fairytale uh so in in miss peltier's comments to the committee last week was that she's unaware of any substantial planning for this transition and that's in her written four-page caught testimony to the senate economic development committee that i find shocking because she's one of the co-commanders of our you know washington northern orange county uh you know command center but where where is the planning that's going to work in direct partnership with the folks on the street this won't even work at a county level this has to work at a municipal level where you're seeing the immediate needs where you're taking care of the immediate needs and you you can't ignore it at a county level you can ignore it i talked to someone who tried to enter the system uh found gets told from barry capstone oh well we've got a two-week waiting period or more uh so yeah we'll schedule a couple weeks out to get you an eval if you sign away all your privacy rights and and no we won't come to montpellier and meet you because we can't afford an office in montpellier i just found that and i even raised that with director mentor that that is so out of touch with cert population cert population doesn't plan two weeks ahead they plan a day or two ahead uh the idea that you can't have an appointment in montpellier was just off the charts absurd uh it's a it is naive to imagine that there'll ever be enough housing stock to simply whisk anyone off the street and lodge them in an apartment with a private bath and kitchen vermont could very well end up attracting thousands of indigent folks from all over the country if we don't anticipate and create a plan for upward integration leading to productive reintegration to paid rental housing and even tiny home ownership some of this will require some few hopefully few will require ongoing transitional and supportive housing not necessarily mental health supervision so while the housing first model is important we need to not wait until we build rehab or invest in very expensive fully outfitted apartments and converted motels to single room occupancy it's important to design a system in incremental steps for upward mobility that rewards initiative that provides opportunity while it enables the dignity of work i i talk to folks today who don't want to work they want to panhandle they don't want to you know they want to have tiny house given to them and i i challenge them on that thought you know i asked his input and even to prepare my testimony so we also need to accommodate travelers both money tourists and the indigent hikers and hitch hikers and panhandlers we could offer a meal a shower an opportunity to make a few bucks to travel on and a range of options for safe sleeping from a hut or a pod to a motel voucher or a spare room in a supportive transitional home here's where the magic happens expert social engagement to assess those needs what are this individual's needs what do they have to offer how long might they be in town what opportunities for food clothing wash up a warm meal a good night's rest what else can we offer there's no reason that this couldn't be part of the stay-to-stay campaign to get people to move to vermont we we need to get off this idea that we're expecting these people to fail and that's what i hear in most of the testimony today we're going to have this chronic cycle of more and more subsidies perpetually and a more and more subsidies for housing stock creating more pressure on the rental market fading higher rents creating fewer people to afford them and therefore greater need for subsidies i think it's fundamentally misguided we need to be investing in the individuals both keeping the rents down and creating opportunity for people to pay the rent so our economy is being run like the jail i was uh respectfully encouraged to leave the property last night i went to talk to some of the folks that i know there and i was met some one of the good samaritan uh employees there's a pair pair of them there they're running it like a jail they've got it locked down they see anybody on the property they chase them down and say you are not to be on the property i found this note attached to the door as a public safety measure no member of the public is allowed in the building guests are not to open doors to those not serve any violation of this rule is grounds for immediate room forfeiture and they upon querying while the police officer was there trying to get rid of me on their behalf i said you let me call them oh no you can't call the call the guests we don't keep we don't transfer any calls to their rooms i'm like what the hell is going on i've sent some pictures of the food they're serving both from mre's and salvation army meals with less than a handful of you know beans or pasta and a piece of white bread and a pad of butter i mean we have opportunity here with our merchants that are down right now to be preparing amazing food and delivering it to these but we're not coordinated that way we're uh i'm sorry i'm a little passionate about this so the assumption is that you will fail rather than succeed it's contaminating the soup they're serving horrible food mre's no visitors threat of forfeiture there's a code of conduct that was not attached to the letter which i was able to achieve as a result of a free public records request the the guests who are staying there have not been given a copy of the code of conduct that they are supposedly living within it's not provided at the locations uh there was one report of a guest saying one of the staff was brandishing a gun during one of the rides uh claiming to be an atf agent they removed the computers there's no internet access no telephone calls nope i think i'm making enough of the point so i believe our somewhat unaccountable non-profit partners are spending large amount of funds from the state in the state of leo office becomes a partner in protecting the legitimacy of those grants not necessarily in opening up transparency into what happened these nonprofits claim to not be subject to public records law they don't reveal how they're spending their money good Samaritan is spending over half a million dollars plus other donations and there's no transparency there at all you know it's uh additionally staff and because of the common board member or chair of the common board uh another way is the day center here in Montpelier and we've got problems staffing i've witnessed the staff they're referring to the guests as worthless hopeless you know just the most grievous demeaning and condescending way of characterizing the people that they're supposed to be there serving so when we i hear testimony that oh this is the peer support i'm like who who where who's been drinking what kool-aid so this there's a staff member who is well let's not get personal there there's an environment of demeaning autocratic authoritarian retaliatory imputative behavior of in these facilities uh one person working there was intimately involved with a guest uh somebody constant asks for a grievance form they were fired i mean this this is an out of control management and these are what you're calling community partners shovel more money at them this is absolutely wrong there's also no appeal route i contacted a number of board members and was told oh i'm i'm not interested i don't care i look i'm i'm leaving that board i mean the boards are not engaged to the point of actually fixing any of these problems so what you've got now is a system of resentment subjugation guests treated as lesser than the homeless are lorded over now it may be possible to reform these organizations and it may not those falling outside of the system due to intolerance of this or are sleeping under bridges there's no public restrooms open anywhere in town there's one porta potty with no sink no shower so the i'm sorry i have i run out of time and i know i have another 10 minutes here so how would you like to handle it mr chair i'm sorry we have to wrap up now steven um i mean what would i mean we hear your message that that that you know you're feeling like the organizations that we're talking about under these circumstances are not acting up to a standard that you would that you expect certainly that we should all expect from them so let me close on a higher note and ask you to take a look at the uh submissions i made i sent a few extras in about food and a problem statement that i co-authored with some others that advocates in the community uh but the conestoga huts and the pods are what are an incremental step that are less than a thousand dollars or or so yesterday tomorrow was prepared to start building those this spring uh i think if i get another opportunity i will i'll need to dig into this coordinated entry in the privacy implications there's a absolutely failed privacy governance around that but but the the opportunity for uh a new model is what i would like i can't i'm i'm competing with another uh well we will take your um we have your material that you sent us on our website and that will be part of our homework um we will be picking up this issue again next week with different testimony but um no thank you for your time and thank you for sharing your thoughts um on this it is uh it is well i will i have an opportunity to complete what i'm waving on right now because that's we do we can we can talk about fitting you in um you and i and and the the um and my administrative assistant committee assistant can work on finding a time um if you would like to continue testimony but we we need to finish today and um as you know where we do have limited time but we will work with you to try to find more time for you in the next week or so thank you all right um committee it's 203 and i want to be respectful of our schedule and our time um we spent um so thank you very much i think i'll adjourn today's meeting and um