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The City has a very active Homeless Alliance (Continuum of Care) which meets
monthly and covers the greater Burlington metropolitan area. It has existed
since the late 1980s. The City sends a representative to the monthly Continuum
meetings. The Alliance was awarded $681,779 in the last round of HUD’s Continuum
of Care Super NOFA, and applied for $758,015 in the current round. Continuum services are delivered through a consortium of
nonprofit organizations, housing developers, and the Burlington
Housing Authority. Continuum nonprofits are funded through a
combination of federal, state, local, private and United Way funds.
In this program year, the City provided CDBG grants for a number of
local Continuum programs; information on those grants can be found
under the “Protecting the
Vulnerable” affordable housing priority section of the CAPER.
Burlington was the first city in New England, and the first small city in
the nation, to develop a
10-Year Plan to End Homelessness. The Plan outlines
a series of steps designed to make permanent housing available to everyone
(including the chronically homeless), affordable and in a form appropriate
to their needs, with services also available to ensure stable tenure.
As the point-in-time numbers in the
housing outcome indicators
section show, the City is seeing an increase in homelessness. As
part of this trend, providers are serving clients with more
complicated issues who often fall through the cracks of the
treatment system. For example, for clients with mental health
problems and Multiple Sclerosis (lesions on the brain, seizures,
outbursts of rage from the brain lesions), no mental health
treatment may be available because the MS is causing the mental
health issue. People who have developmental delays such that they
don't have the capacity to navigate a schedule or bus route often
have IQs too high to be eligible for services. The number of trauma
and abuse victims (sexual/physical/childhood) is increasing, with
backgrounds of abuse often followed by years of self-destructive
behaviors.
This year, we did see a number of advances on 10-Year Plan action
items. Legislation to extend foster care to age 21 (to ensure that
youth exiting state’s care do not become homeless when financial
support is cut off) was submitted and reviewed this past year, and
is currently under study to determine cost impacts.
With funding from the Department of Corrections, the Burlington
Housing Authority initiated an Offender Re-entry Housing Planning
process, which culminated in a November 2005 Offender Re-entry
Housing Plan, endorsed by the six largest Chittenden County cities
and towns. As the first steps in implementing a better discharge
process for offenders returning to the community, the Burlington
Housing Authority has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding
with the local correctional facility and probation and parole office
regarding housing assistance for returning offenders. The City of
Burlington is in the process of negotiating a Memorandum of
Understanding with the Department of Corrections regarding community
notification. The Plan Document also provides a template for
Memorandum of Understanding between the Department of Corrections
and other communities.
A new transitional housing project for women exiting the
corrections system, called Northern Lights, is underway. The
Burlington Housing Authority has purchased a long-vacant house from
the Catholic Diocese of Burlington and, working with a group of
community- and faith-based service providers, will provide 10 units
of housing in downtown Burlington. A series of community meetings is
helping to overcome some initial resistance to the project. The
Burlington Housing Authority is also working to find a location for
additional transitional housing for men exiting corrections.
Another transitional housing project, for victims of domestic
violence, is in the predevelopment stage. This project will provide
12 new units for those who are at less risk from their abusers and
therefore can afford lessened confidentiality in a new housing
situation.
The Homeless Alliance worked with the nonprofit housing
developers to develop a risk pool to offset the narrow operating
margins in nonprofit housing project, which do not raise rents to
cover the possibility of property damage and rent defaults for “high
risk” tenants. The risk pool was financed with an award received by
the Burlington Community Land Trust from Home Depot honoring the
Waterfront Apartment project
and with other private funds. Ten dedicated units in nonprofit
housing projects will now be available as permanent housing for
homeless families.
Serving as a demonstration project over the last two years, the
Chittenden Mental Health Court has reliably engaged non-violent
offenders in mental health treatment, something they had previously
been unable to achieve. In addition to the clinical and humanitarian
effects the court has had on the 44 individual participants served
thus far, the impact on downstream criminal behavior, crisis
services utilization and hospital recidivism has been dramatically
reduced. The preliminary findings suggest that the Mental Health
Court:
- Enhances public safety by reducing criminal behavior:
Participants had a total of 618 criminal charges before
participation, 58 during participation and 10 after
participation.
- Decreases health care costs by avoiding expensive
psychiatric hospitalizations: Participants had a total of 70
admissions to the Vermont State Hospital before participation, 4
during participation and 3 after participation.
- Decreases use of crisis services: Participants had a total
of 596 crisis contacts before participation, 233 during
participation and 110 after participation.
The court hopes to expand through a partnership with the Division
of Public Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, University of
Vermont College of Medicine. This will allow an array of UVM faculty
to bring their expertise to bear on this important project, and will
formally involve the Mental Health Court as a part of the curriculum
of a newly developed fellowship in public psychiatry.
Page last updated September 11. 2006
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