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VHCB and Champlain Housing Trust outline farmworker housing progress as lawmakers weigh S.328 language
Summary
Polly Major of the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board and Julie Curtin of Champlain Housing Trust told lawmakers the on‑farm farmworker housing program has reached dozens of projects, described loan and replacement terms, and urged S.328 language that would require a program progress report rather than a new needs assessment.
Polly Major, director of policy and special projects for the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board, told a legislative committee the board’s on‑farm farmworker housing program was created after a 2021 needs assessment to address a discrete, high‑need population of workers living in or beside farms.
"The program that we established was focused, specifically on farm worker housing as a really high need and unique population," Major said, describing the board’s recommendation and the resulting request for proposals that led to Champlain Housing Trust running the program.
The program emerged from a VHCB‑commissioned synthesis of research and surveys released in 2021 that identified roughly 600 on‑farm dwellings in need of improvement and described systemic problems such as overcrowding, inadequate appliances, moisture and septic issues, and lead hazards. The assessment also estimated about 2,000 hired farmworkers live on or next to farms and roughly 6,500 work independently off‑farm.
Julie Curtin, director of…
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