BRATTLEBORO-With this month's effective end to the state's motel voucher program on July 1, a community art space has transformed into an oasis of sorts for people who are without shelter as demand for resources and needs have increased drastically.
According to data from VTDigger sourced from the state Department for Children and Families (DCF), 73 adults and 34 children in the Brattleboro district were evicted from motels last week. They are among more than 800 people statewide who were released from the program.
Amid the already acute epidemic of homelessness in the region, 69a, at 69a Elliot St., has become a safe space for all, offering free coffee, tea, water, WiFi access, various gear and supplies (including tents, sleeping bags, flashlights, and clothing), and a place to relax and regroup - including "restrooms, music, and people to talk to," according to a flyer.
Lisa Marie, an unhoused person from the area, effectively runs the space, alongside a few others, including Dave, who has put his food service experience to use in 69a's commercial kitchen to make meals for people who stop in.
"I'm trying to, you know, get [them] healthy," Dave says. "You feed people, you feed them well, and it's much better than eating out of a garbage can."
Dave also says he feels an immense gratification feeding people healthy, sustaining meals, and part of that gratification comes from his desire to cook food that "brings back good memories from before their predicament."
'Cruelty at its highest level'
The people who were still in the motel program, instituted during the pandemic, already "had to meet an extremely high bar of vulnerability in order to be able to be housed," says Brenda Siegel, of Newfane, executive director of End Homelessness Vermont, which advocates for unhoused clients and attempts to help them into safety and shelter.
The doors to state resources have now been effectively closed.
"The people who qualified had to be highly medically vulnerable by either proving that they had in home nursing care, that they were in active treatment for cancer, kidney, liver, or heart conditions, or that they were homebound," Siegel says. "So we're talking about very highly vulnerable people that when you actually break it down, most people agree should be sheltered."
An executive order from Gov. Phil Scott this spring extended the program from April through June with verbiage that the normal time limits of 80 days per year wouldn't apply, and Siegel says that she and other advocates were working with clients to find stable housing believing that some clients would still qualify for shelter when the clock would start back up in July.
But DCF sent notices to clients on June 4 that under the executive order, the nights spent in motels for the three month extension would count, leaving anyone who benefited from the executive order to not qualify for motel shelter until the program resumes in December.
Siegel has a client who requires full-time care that he can receive if housed.
"We looked for housing for him based on the the what we thought was very clear that he would still have 80 days," she says. "We found a potential apartment that looks like it's going to come through in mid-August. But he will die outside between July 1 and mid-August because he requires electricity for his wheelchair, electricity for a breathing machine at night. He has seven-days-a-week care that does not follow you outdoors, and he can't eat or bathe or go to the bathroom without support and help."
An appeals process is available but the process is onerous, clients need support from advocates who are overwhelmed, and Siegel says that DCF's guidance has largely been verbal, meaning there's no paper trail to advocate for clients during fair hearings.
"The other option is individual donors, but we'd have to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to keep people who are this vulnerable inside all the way till Dec. 1," Siegel says. "I mean this - they really are killing people. It will kill people. There is no question. Because these are people that cannot live outside for five straight months."
End Homelessness Vermont had volunteers in every county in the state helping clients on July 1. "What I saw on Tuesday was the worst thing in humanity I have ever seen our state execute in my life," Siegel says. "This was cruelty at its highest level."
'We thought something was missing'
In Brattleboro, 69a is sending a different message, with a flyer ending with the simple phrase, "Only love can conquer hate."
"We believe that everyone should have a place to feel seen and rest and be nourished," the flyer says.
Behind the scenes is organizer Katie Bachler, who, with husband Scott Berzofsky, tapped into their savings to rent the space last winter in the aftermath of the national election and last year's contentious local debate over "acceptable community conduct."
The ordinance was adopted by the Selectboard but rescinded by a special Representative Town Meeting.
Without knowing the exact contours of how the space would actually be used, the former owners of Avenue Grocery did know they wanted to restore a community gathering place in the same spirit of the community convenience store that they briefly ran on Western Avenue in 2017 and 2018.
"We thought something was missing, a place for new ways of being to emerge, to care for each other, [to] provide something else, something emergent," Bachler said in an email to The Commons. "Like a space that could be an alternative to the behavior ordinance. Like a space to organize different ways of being, to learn from each other."
She and Berzofsky, starting slow with a loose group of community members organizing events like book clubs and art shows, "really wanted to take it slow and not over-prescribe what 69a was going to be."
Bachler met Lisa Marie in April, and "we really connected," she said.
With Bachler and Berzofsky now working mostly in the background, Lisa Marie and Dave keep 69a open Monday through Friday, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and are hoping to expand those hours to seven days per week.
'We're not living. We're dying.'
Everyone experiencing homelessness who comes into 69a has had a journey. Lisa Marie and Dave are no exceptions.
Born and raised in the area, Lisa decided to move out West and get married.
"I was in love. Or, I thought I was," she says. "A few months after we got married, he started beating me." She filed for divorce and lost everything, she says.
Lisa Marie came back East but could not find shelter with her family and ended up "living outside for eight months" until she was finally accepted into the voucher program.
By April, her 80 days came to an end, and she was back to living outside. Struggling with multiple health issues, she applied for medical housing but was denied because she could not find a doctor to jump through the program's onerous medical documentation requirements.
Lisa Marie observes that the motel program is not a panacea.
"It ain't the Ritz," she says. "You're dealing with black mold, bugs, drugs, guns, knives. You're dealing with staff who are pedophiles and sex offenders, and the hotels have pedophiles and sex offenders living there, with kids living there, too."
"However," she says, "And this is a big point: It is safer [to live] in a hotel than to die out in the weather. They are needed. Yes, there are a lot of problems with these hotels, but it doesn't matter the conditions of them at this point. What matters is that there's a roof over their heads, there's power, there's water. That's what matters."
Some people consider unhoused people to be "living for free," says Lisa Marie, who says that "being homeless is a full-time job."
"We're not living for free," she says. "We're not living. We're dying."
Dave, a gentle giant, found himself homeless after a landlord locked him out of his apartment. Also suffering health issues, and with nowhere to go, he ended up at the Brattleboro Retreat for short-term treatment before being accepted into the motel voucher program.
He tried looking for work, but found it as a struggle due to the lack of transportation resources in the area.
"It's pigeonholed," he said. "You pretty much have to rely on the bus services" if you cannot drive, Dave adds, bristling at the suggestion that homeless folks should simply just get a job and says that finding stable employment is nearly impossible without an address, identification of some sort, and/or a bank account.
Dave says that roughly 70 people per day stop by 69a Elliot St. asking for day jobs - jobs that can be paid cash just to avoid these impediments to actual employment.
'We need this kind of infrastructure'
How do you fund an enterprise that advertises itself as "a space for community where you don't need to spend money, where you can just be"?
Overhead for the space is now covered by donations and crowdfunding. A GoFundMe campaign raised more than $2,500, and a Patreon page brings in $180 per month.
"We need this kind of infrastructure to build relationships and networks of care," Bachler writes on the Patreon appeal.
Reliable volunteers are always needed, as are donations.
Bachler says that the space has found its footing in Lisa Marie's and Dave's embrace of its potential. "I think it was all about trying to get to this point," she says. "69a was a question, and what Lisa and Dave are doing is the answer."
For more information about 69a and to donate or volunteer, visit 69abrattleboro.org.
This News item by Rye O'Brien and Jeff Potter was written for The Commons.