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By VDC staff
The Church Street Marketplace Commission of Burlington is asking Gov. Phil Scott for continued State Police patrols, state help opening a 100-bed homeless shelter, the return of Burlington’s Accountability Court and development of a new state mental health facility, warning that some downtown businesses may be only months away from closing.
In a letter to Scott, the nine-member commission described downtown Burlington as “essentially in a state of emergency” and said business owners, employees and property owners are reporting that “time is running out.”
The commission thanked Scott for deploying Vermont State Police troopers to Burlington but said more state action is needed.
“Immediate, substantive and collaborative action must be taken as soon as possible,” the commissioners wrote.
The commission made four requests: continued deployment of State Police in Burlington; state support for the Champlain Valley Office of Economic Opportunity’s effort to open a 100-bed, year-round, low-barrier emergency shelter by this winter; restoration of the Accountability Court in Burlington; and an Agency of Human Services plan for a state mental health facility to replace or expand upon services once provided by the former Vermont State Hospital in Waterbury.
The commissioners said the first three measures could produce immediate results while demonstrating that state and city officials consider conditions downtown a priority.
The commission also argued that Burlington’s problems have statewide economic consequences, citing Chittenden County’s contribution to state tax revenues and Burlington’s role in Vermont tourism.
“A crisis in Burlington is a crisis for the State,” the letter said.
The commission offered to work with the Scott administration to implement the proposals and urged the governor to give the requests immediate attention.
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Categories: Burlington
The Burlington crisis is not my problem and do not expect me to bail out your worthless as,,, Comment from Richard Day.
If I’m not mistaken, most of the homeless that make their way to Montpelier and Burlington come from ALL over the state. The reason they go there are for the social services provided. So, in fact, the Burlington crisis is all of Vermont’s problem. Another point worth considering, Burlington generates the highest total municipal and economic revenue in Vermont, so a lot of that money trickles down to the small, rural (economically destitute) communities.
I called BS. Burlington created the mess they’re in. They made decisions about policing, dealing with drugs and many other things, that many people from other parts of the state would not have made. They need to get their own way out of the mess they created.
Burlington made their own mess – nothing from that cesspool trickles down to northern Vermont, except the drug dealers you refuse to imprison.
How many out of state homeless are drawn to Burlington? Gang and fentanyl trafficking also. Burlington already sucks most of our state budget, no? Bad policies created this!
There is reason they go there are for the social services provided. So, put a stop to the service! If you stop feeding a stray cat it will find food somewhere else!! And if Burlington generates the highest total municipal and economic revenue (why are they in the position there in) in Vermont, Use all this revenue to build the 100 bed shelter you want. I worked at the old state hospital, we all knew it was a bad Idea to take the over 100 patients that were there and spend millions to replace it with a facility half it size not not take in the fact they may need a bigger facility in the future! At one point there were 1500 patients when it was built and had a farm which supplied food for all the patients.
My name’s Brian Judd. I am running as an Independent Candidate for Governor in November of 2026. Through an addiction to alcohol and drugs I was homeless twice in Florida from 1986 – 1990. I came home to Vermont, asked God and Family and Friends for help, went to in house treatment and have been Sober and Clean for over 35 years. If I can do it anybody can do it. Not everyone who is homeless has an alcohol and or drug problem. The majority of the Homeless Population is not from Vermont. I meet people who are homeless in my hometown of Barre City every day and tell them my story. In my experience the majority of homeless people I meet are not from Vermont. Through Executive Order I will bring back a State Psychiatric Hospital to Vermont. The State of Vermont would lead you to believe we have one, but we don’t. What we have is a 22 bed facility in a building adjacent to our hospital in Berlin. We need to bring back loitering and vagrancy ordinances for cities and towns and or loitering and vagrancy laws for our state. They worked. First, if you are homeless and not from Vermont you need to go back to where you came from. Where you came from is who has the responsibility to help you solve your homeless problem. God Bless You. I sincerely wish you well. The Experiment has failed. No longer will we be advertising in out of state newspapers in New England and the East Coast to entice homeless people from other states to come to Vermont for free benefits. Just that simply we have eliminated 51 – 64 percent of the homeless problem in Vermont. We will help the remaining homeless population here in Vermont and get them off the street and give them medical and psychiatric evaluation and or treatment and or education and or on the job training that will give them temporary shelter that will lead to temporary housing that will lead to permanent housing. These are simple but not easy fixes. These are not natural disasters. God did not create these problems. These are Woman and Man made problems and Woman and Man can fix them. If elected Governor I will do everything in my power through Supreme Executive Power and the Vermont State Constitution to end or dramatically improve homelessness in the State of Vermont. Thank you. God Bless You All.
Brian Judd 802-839-9985 brianjuddward2@gmail.com
House and feed the homeless and they shall come……
All your candidacy is going to do is jeopardize Scott’s reelection campaign. You have no chance of getting elected. I can’t help wonder if you are being funded by the progressive and democratic parties. There was a time when people would think about the greater good but not so much today.
Both I and my wife are voting for you. I refuse to vote for King Philip the Scott 1st Eunuch King of Castrati. It is the progressives that put him in office because they know he is not a true conservative. He signed both the 30 rd magazine ban and the three-day waiting period to purchase a firearm violating both the Vermont an U.S. constitution’s thus violating his oath of office. He did the total opposite if what he campaigned on. And as far as jeopardizing Scott’s reelection he should have thought of that before he decided to placate the Commiecrats. Let the chips fall where they may.
Brian Judd, if you wanted to be governor running on a conservative platform you should have challenged Scott in the Republican primary. At this point you are a tool of the democrats.
I’m curious how the “30 rd magazine ban and the three-day waiting period to purchase a firearm [violate] both the Vermont an U.S. constitution’s”…
Under the SCOTUS Bruen decision, the government must prove that a challenged law fits historical patterns of firearm limits from American history. There have historically been no restrictions of how many rounds a magazine could hold and there is no historical basis for any waiting period/”cooling off” period. FYI, the “30 round magazine ban” you cite is actually a ban on handguns magazines holding more than 15 rounds and for a long gun, that restriction is 10 rounds maximum. If you suddenly awake from a deep sleep to the sound of some brazen junkie kicking in your door, are you ok with a magazine size restriction? I’m not ok with it.
This business advocacy’s suggestions would be mostly effective, except for the one about building more beds to accommodate people claiming to be homeless. All the entities which have done that in the past whether directly governmental or private with public funding have only enhanced Burlington’s reputation for accommodating vagrancy and establishing it on the map to attract deadbeats from all over the country, exacerbating the problems. To reduce the problems, the business owners should be actively opposing the siting of any new so-called harm reduction services like a “safe injection facility” and push to get rid of the new needle giveaway program on Bank Street. Having bloody, potentially pathogenic, used syringes littered all around public spaces is NOT a harm reduction program. It just shifts the harm onto unsuspecting, innocent users of public spaces who made no conscious decision to engage in the well-known risks of recreational IV drug use.
Burlington has created their own issues. They jumped on the progressive wagon which we all know would be a disaster. The rest of the state should not have to keep bailing burlington out, especially since they already get most of the state resources. Also, their progressive mayor should not be allowed to stay in her position as she has proven time and time again that she can’t handle it. If anybody else had such disastrous results at work, we would be fired. As long as she is in office I oppose Burlington being bailed out!