Delegation staff: USDA Rural Development programs underutilized in Vermont because of complexity and staffing shortfalls

Federal staff told the Senate Committee on Government Operations on Feb. 13 that some U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development (USDA RD) programs are not working well for Vermont communities, especially for housing and community facilities in small towns.

"It is too hard to deploy the housing funding, in a way that works in Vermont," said Ryan McClellan, senior adviser for Senator Peter Welch. He cited both staffing reductions at USDA RD and program rules that small communities find difficult to navigate as reasons that eligible applicants often choose alternative federal programs instead of RD.

McClellan said USDA RD's application and administrative requirements can be particularly burdensome for towns and organizations with limited technical capacity. "People that have used them in Vermont have decided that it's not worth their time or energy to continue using them because they are so complicated and difficult," he said.

Committee members raised farmworker housing as a specific concern; McClellan and other staff said the delegation is coordinating with local organizations and stakeholders to explore pragmatic fixes. Staff emphasized that the problems described were not limited to a single constituency or project type and that some Vermont applicants have opted to use HUD programs rather than USDA RD despite HUD's own complexities.

The delegation said they will use Welch's subcommittee jurisdiction over rural development and farm credit to examine operational fixes, including staff capacity at USDA RD and rule changes to make programs simpler to administer at Vermont's scale. No legislative action was taken at the session; staff offered to follow up as the committee compiles further local examples.

The discussion was framed as a programmatic implementation problem rather than a change in federal law.