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Advocates warn budget cuts will deepen Vermont shelter gap as need rises
Summary
Advocates told the House Human Services Committee that recent budget changes and limited shelter capacity risk worsening homelessness statewide, citing new housing-need estimates, coordinated-entry counts and a sharp reduction in proposed production funding.
House Human Services members heard multiple providers and advocates say Vermont’s homelessness crisis is growing while state funding to produce affordable housing and support shelter exits is shrinking.
“About half of those homes need to be affordable,” Frank Knecht, executive director of the Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont, told the committee as he summarized the Vermont Housing Needs Assessment. Knecht said the assessment found the state needs between 24,000 and 36,000 new homes this decade and about 15,000 of them must be affordable.
Knecht said coordinated-entry data from March showed 4,971 people statewide — including more than 1,100 children — seeking help through that system, while the statewide shelter capacity is just 655 households. He told the committee those numbers show the coordinated-entry…
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