|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
By Guy Page
An organization supporting passage of this year’s Continuum of Care law providing funding and services for the homeless has itself received $200,000 in funding as part of this year’s state budget, signed into law last week by Gov. Phil Scott.
According to a June 19 press release issued by Executive Director Brenda Siegel, End Homelessness Vermont has secured its first-ever state appropriation, receiving $200,000 in the recently enacted FY2027 state budget to support housing and case management services for Vermonters experiencing homelessness and housing insecurity.
End Homelessness Vermont urged passage of H.938, the Vermont Homelessness Response Continuum bill, which passed in the Legislature May 21 and was signed into law on June 16. Now Act 143, the law calls for $82 million for the “implementation of the Vermont Response Continuum, shelter development and operation, rental assistance, and supportive services, including case management. “The Legislature eventually allocated $20 million instead, as part of the general fund budget.
The funding, approved in the annual budget by the Vermont Legislature and signed into law by Gov. Phil Scott, will help the organization continue providing statewide housing navigation, case management, service coordination, technical assistance, appeals assistance and permanent housing support for individuals with disabilities and complex needs, Siegel said.
“This is a moment of profound recognition, not just for our organization, but for the people we serve,” said Brenda Siegel, executive director of End Homelessness Vermont. “Every single person on our team has lived experience of either homelessness or housing insecurity, and living with a disability.” Siegel has been an outspoken advocate of funding and legislation for Vermont’s homeless. She first came to many Vermnters’ attention in 2021 when she slept in a tent on the State House steps to protest the plight of the homeless, whose numbers spiked dramatically during the Covid crisis that restricted access to traditional shelters.
According to the organization, the $200,000 appropriation represents about one-third of its FY2027 case management funding goal. The budget language specifically recognizes End Homelessness Vermont’s role in providing “essential services to unhoused Vermonters including service navigation and coordination from crisis through housing stability, technical assistance, and concrete supports.”
Founded as a hotline to help people find shelter and services, End Homelessness Vermont has expanded into two divisions: the Office of Housing Advocate and the Office of Research and Advocacy. The organization says it assists thousands of Vermonters each year, helping individuals navigate housing crises and secure permanent housing.
Siegel credited lawmakers and community partners for supporting the funding request, including members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees and the House Human Services Committee.
Discover more from Vermont Daily Chronicle
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Categories: Housing, Legislation
And yet homelessness is getting worse? The more handouts you give, the more people there will be holding out their hands.
(I foresee droves of prositutes descending on New York for that yummy free healthcare.)
I understand that we must care for those who are unable to work, but I’m sick and tired of supporting those who CHOOSE not to work.
I’ve met very few “handicap” people that could not do some sort of valuable work that could contribute to society and the economy. It would help everyone, and they might actually get a good feeling by doing a needed job. The State Offices of Tax, Fiscal management, and Secretary seem to be failing at their desk jobs, why not start there and get those guys out in the fields and forests producing something for once? They seem to need a lesson in hard work.
Give a man a fish, and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime.
Giving the homeles (free shelter, free food, and free medical) without and responsibility for self sufficientcy or growth, and education is NOT care, and it is NOT kind. Enabling
People to stay in the same condition year after year hurts everyone, including the taxpayers. It also invites more homeless. Helping people is a good thing, but it has conditions including an end date. Real help comes with education that forces them off government dependance. When the numbers are increasing, you know the guidelines need modifications.
If you keep paying the tab for a drunk in a bar, why would they want to leave????? Homeless operations are just another way of laundering money for special interest groups.
With all the national attention on the obscene levels of fraud discovered among social service NGO’s, I hope this organization will feel obligated use that money wisely and transparently. But let’s face it, the LAST thing that Siegel’s organization End Homelessness Vermont wants to do is actually end homelessness, since that is their reason to exist and her bread and butter.
“The organization says it assists thousands of Vermonters each year, helping individuals navigate housing crises and secure permanent housing.”
Would it be too much to ask that it provide verifiable benchmarks, data and references regarding just how many people it helped to place into permanent housing and the percentage decline in the unhoused population following these policies?
Should be child’s play, given the complexity of benchmarks in, say, the GWSA.
They help thousands of people each year? There are approximately 4200(+,-) in Vermont. In the five years they have been in business, it would seem that there should be no homeless left. It doesn’t add up.
Sorry, 4200 homeless
They allocated $82,600,000 for emergency shelter this next fiscal year. If your number is correct, that’s almost $20,000 per person, not including fringe benefits of SNAP and medicare. Let’s round it off to $35,000 per year, per person, tax free. After taxes, I do not make that much money per year working 40+ hours per week doing something that is uncomfortable to do. After taxes, I don’t even clear $22K.