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Call on Scott to continue emergency housing executive order after he vetoed homeless services bill
by Guy Page
With Governor’s Phil Scott’s veto of H.91, the Homeless Emergency Assistance and Responsive Transition to Housing Program bill, the state’s current emergency housing hotel/motel program must be continued past July 1, homeless advocates said Tuesday June 17 at a press conference on the State House steps.
Failure to extend the program will leave Vermonters living in cars, parks, sidewalks and riverbanks, they said. Vermont has about 5,000 unhoused residents at present, Frank Knaack said. About 384 households now sheltered under the governor’s emergency program will be unhoused July 1. Many are children or disabled people in wheelchairs and on oxygen, the advocates said.
With the proposed law establishing permanent services for the homeless, the executive order should continue so that “people will not be put outside,” one advocate said.
“Vermonters experiencing homelessness and currently sheltered under the Governor’s Executive Order are scheduled to be exited on July 1st. The Governor has decided at the last minute to attribute days used under his order to the maximum shelter allowed for these households. The result of this is that every highly vulnerable Vermonter and child that the Governor identified since March is at risk of having to fend for themselves outside without electricity, services or medical care that they need,” advocate Brenda Siegel said in a June 16 statement.
“We are going to keep showing up” to publicize the plight of homeless people and to call for better services, Siegel said at today’s press conference.
Siegel insisted that homeless Vermonters are seeking housing, and also are seeking help with the root causes of their homelessness, including substance abuse. It’s cruel to suggest otherwise, she said.
Press conference attendees included Siegel; Ken Russell, Another Way Day Shelter Executive Director; Alex Karambelas, Policy Advocate, ACLU of Vermont; Maryellen Griffin, Attorney with Vermont Legal Aid; Frank Knaack, Executive Director, Housing And Homelessness Alliance Of Vermont; Rev. Jay Boorhees of Vermont Interfaith Action Clergy; and Rep. Brian Cina.
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Categories: Housing
So, pastor, how many cots have you set up at Northfield United Methodist Parish to house the homeless? Have you made room in your parish house? Tents in your backyard? Putting homeless in motels was never intended to solve the problem. Matter of fact, people came to Vermont from other places because Vermont has so many benefits. The astronomical cost of housing them should not be taxpayer burden completely.
Amen!
It is not the job of our state to provide housing… ineffective and overly expensive!
It is the job of us to act as god wants us to and take care of the poor… IF they are part of our communities! Not people bussed in from New York!
I am a flatlander (originally from Detroit MI) Detroit has NEVER put their homeless up in a motel Why? cause they’d never leave. Has Vermont Social Services been in constant contact with each of these adults to find a different solution? rehabilitate those that can be? find section 8 housing ? maybe find suitable housing for them in another State ? Vermont govt needs to give a hand up NOT a handout
Vermont has about 5,000 unhoused residents at present? Where did they all come from? Without the Governor’s veto of H.91, Vermont would soon have two and three or more times that many unhoused residents in Vermont. Word of a gravy train gets out quickly.
People will have to make other accomodations and/or get a job. I suggest that the housing advocates do the right thing and offer up room in their home. Please live by example and others may follow your lead or not
There is a very easy, not cost option. Invite them into your home. Why do you not do this?
With a $9 BILLION dollar budget, why do we run out of money for the poorest? Why are the poorest last on every budget? Because you spend it frivilously on bike paths and huge rebates for solar panels and expensive Tesla cars.
We’ve given you enough. You can invite them into your homes then get back with us.
Please stop the propaganda, our hip waders only go so high.
Why are you giving them such a free pass and really promoting their reckless spending and enabling? One of the problems we have in Vermont is we think we can save people, we can’t save anyone. That is the job of Jesus Christ. Once again we have pastors not doing their real job and suggesting we should be repenting, turning toward Jesus, as he is the only one that can wipe our slate clean and make us new. God want’s all his children happy and blessed, he wants them all saved. Jesus came not to judge, but to heal, to forgive, to lead………didn’t hear anything about Jesus, only give us more money.
Our problem is not money, and it never has been, our problem is in our hearts. Until we change our hearts and directions, things are not going to get better.
Our churches have become political activitism, with the United Nations agenda written into the Book of Discipline, no less.
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. If you deny him, he will deny you. You will be homeless, forever. May the Holy Spirit enter the hearts of God’s people, I ask in Jesus name.
ICE Raided a Food Plant. Americans Rushed to Apply for Opened-Up Jobs Catherine Salgado June 17, 2025 PJMedia.com Send the homeless to apply. Yes, it’s out of state and it’s warm out there in LA.
Tell them to get a job and pay for their own motel room
I am a Psych nurse and I see all kinds of out of state people with mental health issues coning here for treatment. One person I met specifically told me she planned to stay in her current residential halfway house type place for at LEAST two years because “it is free” (to her). She thinks it’s great bc she gets her own room, three hots meals a day, transport to wherever she wants to go (i.e. shopping trips), a cash stipend every month and free health care. She asked rhetorically why she would ever leave bc then she would have to get a job or be homeless again. There are a lot of people who are apparently “allergic” to work- and even more so once they have plugged in to the gravy train.
perhaps if all that standing and grifting for ukraine, or isreal, or palestine were used for people on our soil – perhaps if all the free money given over to illegals were used to help our own citizens – perhaps if, year over year, the legislature and administration did not wash, rinse, and repeat the same message of a crisis, blew through millions of dollars, and the situation only got 10x worse – they don’t solve issues – they exacerbate them. depopulation, wealth transfer, reset – technocracy for one and all
So homeless in Vermont, are they Vermonters or just vagrants, as that would be my guess, as Vermont and it bleeding hearts handing out, on taxpayers backs !!
I have seen what the ones that were put up, under the Governors order, they turned the properties into a cesspool of trash, they have no morals and no responsibility, prove your a real Vermonter and have lost everything and we’ll help, if not pack your back and go back where you came from.
Vermonters for Vermonters, not vagrants looking for hand outs, and that’s what we have today………………. wake up people.
https://www.gotquestions.org/Bible-homeless.html
A lot of them are NOT Vermonters, though. They can go home, and their home states: states who have been keeping their money by tricking us into paying for their problems. These states will have to deal with their issues rather than impoverish Vermonters to avoid them.
Roughly 60% of voucher participants (according to the motel owners) are not Vermonters. If we initiated a residency requirement, it would solve the funding shortfall.
Get a job, they have been living off the taxpayers for years. Plenty of time to save money and get a job.
Rather than focus on the homeless (none of us want to see people in distress) we need to focus on the NGOs that are drumming up all the “need”. Who are they and how many jobs are they protecting when the taxpayer foots the bill for all this social upheaval? Vermont has a tremendous number of NGOs that get money from many sources, much of that money pays for salaries and justifies the NGO (501-c3, c4 etc) employee and the work they develop. As always … follow the money.
Exactly! No one seems to answer the question why the wealthiest country in the world has so many, including veterans, living on the streets, in their cars, hotels, or in the woods. They rather pull out their wide paint brushes and paint the scene that suits their blindness. How Christian-like to judge or condemn a brother and/or sister – is that what Jesus would do? Be careful of judgment for soon an illness or loss of income will put many more out on the streets. Vermont emulates and mirrors California – gee, wonder why?
Courtesy of AI: “California has spent a significant amount of money on homelessness, with estimates ranging from $20 billion to $37 billion over the past five years. In the 2021-22 fiscal year, the state spent $7.2 billion on homelessness, equating to nearly $42,000 per homeless individual. However, despite this substantial investment, the homeless population has continued to grow. Despite these expenditures, the number of homeless individuals in California continues to increase, raising questions about the effectiveness of current strategies and spending. A state audit revealed that California lacks reliable data to fully understand the impact of its various homelessness programs. The audit also highlighted that many programs are not cost-effective and that the state needs to do more to assess the cost-effectiveness of its homelessness programs.”
Cry me a river