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Balint comment prompts question to state nursing home regulators
By Guy Page
The Vermont Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL) revealed this week that a number of Vermont’s nursing homes failed to meet state and federal staffing requirements over the past year.
In a recent town hall visit to a Newport, Rep. Becca Balint sparked debate with a blunt comment about the state’s labor shortage, saying, “If we don’t have avenues for people to come here legally to work or to build a home here… we’re not gonna have anyone around to wipe our a**es because we don’t have enough people” (‘Potty Politics,’ June 1 Compass Vermont).
The remark, picked up from VDC by Fox News, an quoting former GOP candidates Mark Coester and Paul Bean, was apparently intended to underscore the urgent need for immigration reform and workforce development, drew mixed reactions. It earned praise from some for its honesty and urgency, while others criticized it as crass or both dismissive and denigrating towards immigrants.
The comment has reignited broader discussions on social media around Vermont’s aging population, shrinking workforce, and the role of legal immigration in sustaining rural communities. It does not appear to have been covered by many – if any – statewide media outlets other than VDC and Compass Vermont.
Yesterday, Tuesday June 3, VDC asked state officials about worker staffing in the state’s nursing homes. Rebecca Silbernagel, Principal Assistant to the commissioner of DAIL, responded with the following information.
Between June 1, 2024, and June 1, 2025, four out of the state’s 36 licensed nursing homes — 11.1% — were cited for violating Vermont’s more stringent staffing standards. Six facilities, or 16.7%, were found to be out of compliance with federal staffing regulations. All four of the homes cited for violating state rules were also included in the federal count.
While DAIL does not track specific staff numbers, the agency’s Division of Licensing and Protection surveys nursing homes to ensure sufficient care hours are being provided. Facilities can be cited when direct care hours fall short of legally mandated thresholds.
State requirements mandate that nursing homes provide a minimum of three hours of direct care per resident per day, averaged weekly. Of that, at least two hours must be provided by licensed nursing assistants (LNAs) or equivalent staff, excluding administrative duties or meal preparation.
Federal regulations, under the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, require that facilities maintain “sufficient nursing staff” with the appropriate skills to meet the physical, mental, and psychosocial needs of residents, based on individualized care plans and facility assessments.
As with most businesses, staff shortages are due in part to revenue shortages. In January, 2023, a 30-bed Newport nursing home closed due to low insurance reimbursement rates. At the time, the Visiting Nurses Association of Vermont reported that:
- Vermont has the oldest population in the nation. (As of 2025 Vermont has the second-oldest population, with Maine #1.)
- Vermont’s long-term care facilities are woefully understaffed.
- Vermont’ long-term care facilities are at maximum capacity. Contributing factors to the scarcity of beds are many.
- Vermont’s long-term care facilities are severely underfunded. Part of the problem is low insurance reimbursement rates; another is the nursing shortage requiring heavy reliance on expensive ‘traveler’ nurses.
“We are past the point of preventing a crisis in care,” Jill Mazza Olson, executive director of Visiting Nurses Associations of Vermont, said in a January 5, 2023 statement.
A 2021 Agency of Human Services report on health care worker shortages recommends recruiting workers from out-of-state but does not specifically call for more immigrant workers, legal or illegal.
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Categories: Health Care
We are told to love our neighbor.
We have become so lost, we need to be told to love our family.
We are wasting money hand over fist, in stores it’s called shrink (theft, loss). In our Vermont system there is massive shrink. When there is massive shrink it makes everything much more difficult and expensive, just like in retail, an example.
Somebody steals a $1,000 worth of tools from your hardware store, which for conversation’s sake operates on a 10% margin. In order to pay for those stolen items the store has to sell $10,000 worth of merchandise to get back to zero, only after that are there profits to pay for payroll, health insurance, heat, building/rent.
It is the same with government. We are massively overpaying for things, and we are asking the 33% of middle-class Vermonters to pay the bill. (33% are government employees getting great pay/benefits/33% are getting Vermont free money)
A recent and hot topic is homeless. Nobody would use a motel room for a family member, longer than a week without figuring something out. But Vermont has been doing this for decades. It’s almost like they find the most expensive, stupid way to do things and say that’s it. Boarding homes, use by right. Allowing Campers in back yards. Allowing mobile homes as ADU by right are all simple things that could immediately solve our problem. Primitive shelters on property. They were how we did it for over 200 years. But they only want big government, big money solutions, because they only want more power and money. The heart of Marxism and being part of the first colony of the United Nations.
These UN puppets are the ones who brought us tiny homes on wheels, why isn’t anyone asking….why does my home have to have wheels? This is/was not grass roots, major depreciation, can’t finance, can’t get zoning approval…but it’s pushed. 2nd dumbest idea. How can you raise a family in 250sq.ft? That’s a tough pill. Not to worry, you can bike to work when it’s 15 degrees and slush is falling from the sky.
This pattern of massive misuse of money is rampant everywhere in Vermont Governance, it’s their life blood.
Meanwhile the state of Vermont makes 10% on every transaction in the state, whether you make a profit or loss. At least when the mob collects their protection fee, they understand you need to survive as a business.
What a crass and cavalier comment on Balint’s part. Furthermore, I interpret it as:”We have given up on the idea of educating/training/meaningfully employing our own US citizens…so let’s just import labor from other countries”. That may be a very short term bandaid but is that really the long-term solution? We should just give up on our own country? There is a town near me where the vast majority of the town is on welfare. Why? Well, not because they are not able-bodied adults but rather bc their grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles and cousins have all been on welfare for generations now. It has become a culture. I am sure there are other places like this. Soooo we just want to continue to enable citizens to live on welfare indefinitely while importing labor? Insane.
I totally agree! Vocational Tech is a great way for people to work towards filling these positions at our Nursing Homes and our Communities to assist the elderly! We don’t need a bunch of foreigners that came here illegally to take jobs away from Vermonters! Becca Balint needs to worry about her constituents of all ages and how they will find jobs and housing! Not those illegal border jumpers she loves so much! She is so useless! She needs to go back to New York!!!!
Good job, Balint. You just made it on Not The Bee.
Ok Becca, What have you done to write legislation that would get English speaking people from other countries here legally to help with this problem. Someone once said, “if your not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem”
Becca Balint could work in a nursing home. It would greatly improve her utility to society, and she would become an important role model for hard-working Americans.
I suggest all lawmakers/politicians/community leaders change their vocation to something actually community-oriented and show the American public how it’s done.
The Culling-19 plandemic ripped the veil down on what nursing home facilities are and have become. Want to know the true character of a society? Look how they treat and care for their elders and their children. Disgraceful abomination!
I attempted to contact the “owner” of the facility my mother was housed in. It turned out there were mulitple “owners” (investment scammers – one of which was charged by the State of Pennsylvania for violations in nursing homes he “owned” there.) Their “LLC” business was handled through a financial firm in Washington DC. I called the phone number, couldn’t get through unless I had an extension number. I sent an email to the address on their website. It was rejected – undeliverable as addressee not found.
I went through DAIL and I related those escapades on this platform a few times. I don’t place blame on the advocates there, I place the blame squarely on their bosses, the Legislature, and the Administration. I contacted CMS, the federal arm of Medicare – waste of time – they did not respond at all. All the agencies and operators responsible -they literally do not care!
My mother’s end of life moments in the facility were less than respectful, compassionate, or honorable. The staff, some were nurses rented from Mississippi, did their best. Yet, they were obviously stretched way thin, disorganized, lacking resources, and the care for patients mismanaged fumbling and bumbling. I won’t get into the hospital care she received – another disgrace!
In reviewing the numerous complaints and the numerous want ads for that facility, it is blanantly obvious there is a critical problem with long term care in Vermont. It is being ignored – except for the amount of money that can be stolen and mismanaged to barely administer care to our elders in their greatest time of need.
Consider this Vermonters, one day your loved one or even you, may end up needing 24/7 managed, long term care in a facility. What kind of care do you expect if you are debilitated and unable to care for yourself? Take heed and take action to advocate and protect yourself – if you can, before you end up with no voice and your relatives or legal reps don’t either. Do not be deceived by the liars and reprobates who say they “care” and they will address the issues. They won’t – they haven’t in over 30 years!