VT Harm Reduction Advocates PC: Burlington City Council Proposed Burlington Forward Resolution

Can you believe I'm going to cry myself? I am. Yeah. I uh I used to run the federal housing coalition with Bernie Sanders. How do they look? >> Direct us. Okay. >> Yes. There's not too much space behind us and [laughter] >> no. >> Oh my god. I love your shoes. Thank you. Yeah, definitely. Please, please. >> Testing, testing. How does that sound? Great. Great. Let's get started. >> All right, we're going to get started everyone. Thank you so much. Um, good afternoon. Thank you all so much for being here. Um, just some quick quick housekeeping before we begin. Um, I'm going to start us off followed by some incredible speakers behind me. Um, and then we'll save time for questions at the end. Um, and at 5:30 we'll wrap up, have members of the press and city councilors go into the city council meeting starting at 6 to get settled in. And then we'll be transitioning to um, a community rally where community members will be coming up and talking about some of their thoughts. So, I'll start us off. Y. >> All right. Thank you. >> Perfect. Thanks. >> Thank you. My name is Bella Fern. I'm the lead organizer with the Vermont Harm Reduction Advocates and co-organizer with the Burlington Cleanup Crew. I'm standing here today because like many people in Burlington, I'm very concerned about public suffering we are witnessing in our community. I care deeply about our public spaces, our neighbors, our businesses, and every person who visits and calls Burlington home. I also believe if we are serious about reducing public suffering, we need to focus on solutions that actually work. I'm not interested in supporting policies that simply sound tough. I'm not interested in solutions that make I'm interested in solutions that make our community healthy, safer, and stronger for everyone. This issue is deeply personal to me. In 2022, I lost a family member to an overdose. She was only 22 years old. At the time, I carried a lot of anger. I wanted justice. I wanted people who I wanted the people who supplied her with sub substances to be punished. At the same time, I knew that would not bring her back. it would not prevent another person from dying or spare another family from the same experience of loss. I realized if I wanted to honor her life, I had to look for solutions that actually prevented overdose death. For many years, our response to substance use has been to buil built around punishment, arrest, incarcerate, and the belief that increasing consequences will solve this crisis. But the evidence tells us a very different story. For many people struggling with substance use disorder, incarceration creates a revolving door. Despite countless interventions, um, despite, excuse me, despite countless interventions, people continue to access substances while incarcerated, they often don't get the health care that they need while inside incarceration institutions and they leave with a criminal record that creates additional barriers of to employment, housing, healthcare, and recovery. In fact, there are over 166 state laws outlining these very barriers which keep people trapped in cycles of poverty, homelessness, addiction, and instability. If we choose to send Y if we choose to send people to prison for using If we choose to send people to prison for using substances then that's the cho then that's a choice we need to but we need to be cleareyed about what we are doing when uh what we're doing then to their families and to their futures when they leave. We also need to acknowledge that incarceration is not simply is not a simple or sustainable solution. Incarcerating Vermont Verters is costing taxpayers dollars taxpayers over a half a million dollars a day. Our prison system is already struggling with capacity and those who cannot be held in state prisons are being sent to private prisons like Civic Corps and Geog Group. The notorious private prisons that also are running immigration detention centers. If our goal is to be is to help people survive, heal, recover, we need to invest in systems that create pathways forward, not systems that create more barriers. Harm reduction programs are some of the most important low barrier health care spaces in our community. They provide sterile supplies that reduce the spread of infectious diseases like HIV, hepatitis C. But their impact goes far beyond prevention. They often are the first place where people can access connection, case management, health care services, referrals, treatment and support without judgment. Preventing disease and connecting people to care not is not only compassionate is fiscally is fiscally responsible. Health conditions save health uh health conditions save health care costs, reduce long-term medical complications, and create opportunities for people to engage with health care and support that they need. These systems are what we need to invest in and we need to get serious about investing in these about addressing public suffering and overdose. Substance use disorder is a chronic relapsing health condition. This means that people with substance use disorder often experience periods of active use, reduced use, non-use, returned use throughout their lives. If we are if we have to if we are going to respond to the reality of this condition, we need to do it in a way that works. That is why an overdose prevention centers are such a critical part of public health response. An overdose prevention center is a data-driven public health intervention designed to keep people alive and connected, connect them to support. They also improve our public spaces. When people have access to safe, supervised environments, supportive services, they are much less likely to use substances in public and encourage people to dispose of use syringes in safe, responsible ways. My work at the Burlington Cleanup Crew has made this reality very clear to me. Every mo every Thursday morning at 7:30, I go out with the volunteers and clean up. We pick up trash, collect improperly, discarded syringes, distribute harm reduction supplies. We are actively working to expand access to public sharps containers because we know these are the tools that remove properly discarded syringes. So I want to be clear. Supporting harm reduction does not mean ignoring ignoring the challenges we are facing. It means confronting those challenges with solutions that are proven to work. That is why the Vermont Harm Reduction Advocate strongly opposes the Burlington forward resolution. The resolution will undermine the progress of existing health strategies, delay implementation of an overdose prevention center, and create additional barriers to life-saving overdose prevention service, overdose prevention services, ultimately make it harder to reduce public suffering and improve the community and not improve the community we want to serve. People in Burlington deserve solutions grounded in evidence policies, not policies that slow our progress. I'm asking the Burlington City Council to reconsider this resolution. Support harm reduction strategies already making a difference in our community. Delaying evidence-based solutions will only prolong preventable suffering and death. Investing in proven Invest in proven public health solutions. Every day matters. Every delay matters. People are dying from preventable public health crisises. People are suffering in our public spaces. And we have the opportunity to respond with an evidence-based strategy with compassion and courage. I we can build a Burlington where people are safe, neighborhoods are healthier, where people struggling with substance use disorder have the opportunity to survive, recover, and thrive. The overdose crisis is far from over. Our response cannot be delayed. Thank you. [applause] >> And thank you all. And next up, I'm gonna have Jean Berkin. >> Can Can you do this? Excellent. >> Okay. So, can you all hear me? >> All right. Uh, thank you, Bella. And thanks to everyone in the community and in the press who have come out. Um, my name is Jean Bergman. I'm the chair of the progressive uh city council caucus of Burlington and the city councelor for W 2 in the old north end. And first I want to thank you um all of you for the work that you're doing in our community to make us stronger and healthier and safer and to make this community fairer. Anyone who thinks that government alone can solve our problems, human and those created by advanced capitalism, does not know how things work. We need you to build the alternatives to make existing programs and policies work better and to imagine new ways of doing things to doing the work of building a better community, a new world, and to be part of its creation. I'm here to tell you that the progressive caucus opposes this resolution because it it does not do this. [applause] It does not do this work of building a new world. In fact, it calls on us to go backwards. >> That's right. >> It conflates poverty and its manifestations with disorder and criminality. Mhm. >> It calls your mutual aid a failure and it seeks to ban you from providing it. It calls on us to sweep away the only homes some people have their tents and remove their belongings knowing they have nowhere to go, hoping to make life so miserable that they have to leave and go bother someone else. It threatens and undermines constitutional rights of assembly and free speech and association. All of our rights and all with a gloss of soothing words like compassion using a technocratic words like accountability, like a glove to cover an iron fist. >> That's right. >> A clampdown. Well, you know, people are hurting everywhere and things are getting worse. So, when the CL clampdown comes for one group, you know, it's going to come for another. That's what authoritarians do. They pick on the most vulnerable and demonize them and then they go on to the next unless we stop them. We progressives are committed to safe public spaces, public health, housing stability, an equitable economy, regional responsibility, and the dignity of every person in our community. This proposal moves us away from that goal. Now, if you think about it, you'll see that enforcement does have a role in any system in order to deal with destructive behaviors and deter people from acting with impunity. But there has to be a link between enforcement and public space strategy and a clear commitment to expand shelter and housing, to fund outreach and case management, to protect access to harm reduction and recovery services. to improve public safety policies and the state justice system and to better coordinate with state agencies. Success will not happen without all of these things. This resolution moves us away from this commitment. At the heart of our work, of all of our work, is that we care for people who are suffering. >> That's right. >> And that includes, they might not believe it, local businesses and their employees. But the question is, how do we deal with the harms effectively within our resources and power? Now, I could list the specific problems with this resolution, but I am going to spare you. Instead, I want to reiterate that we reject the Democrat framework and call for one that truly engages you and city staff and partners and stakeholders across the board. one does not that does not use this backward moving framework as its baseline and instead truly takes into account our current capacity to act, our partnerships, staffing, revenues and our priorities. So, thank you for standing up and fighting back. The question before us, as Dr. King said, is where do we go? Chaos or community? I choose community. I know you do too. Veneros. [applause] >> Thank you so much, Shane. And now we're going to have Merrick um Sigour to board 8 city council speak. >> Can you hear me? >> Yep. >> Great. Um hi folks, my name is Merrick Broadick. I represent W 8 on the city council. Um, thank you to Jean for um, being eloquent as always. Um, and thank you all for coming out. What we have before us today is not just any public safety resolution that we have seen for the past three years. What we have before us today is a 20page vision for our city that upholds and enforces a failed status quo in our city. One that is putting profit over people. It calls for more investment in the criminalization and erasure of the unhoused and those with substance use disorder, portraying their existence as one that undermines the peace and comfort of our city's public spaces. I must ask, peace and comfort for who? >> That's right. Certainly not for those being forcibly displaced again and again because for the thousandth time they have nowhere else to go. That's right. >> I find no peace in this. I find no peace in the calls for increasing our capacity to surveil people. I find no peace in a city that wants to sweep encampments and scatter people to fates that I may never know. I ask all of you to think of this as I talk. Who does this actually serve? >> That's right. >> This vision seeks to gut the city's role in providing support and care to its residents. It wants to replace union labor hired to provide supportive care to people with volunteers. Now, I have nothing against volunteers in general, but not at the cost of strong union jobs that the city can provide for its residents. [applause] Also in place of supportive care, this resolution wants to enlist volunteer vigilantes with the authority to quote intercede conduct that unreasonably interferes with the public's use and enjoyment of Burlington's public spaces. What does that mean? And who does this serve? It egregiously calls for the city to ban the overdose prevention center from being where people need it most despite their existence while primarily existing to save lives and should be reason enough also would reduce public drug use. Who does this serve? >> That's right. >> It attempts to paint mutual aid. members of our community who see where the government has failed to provide for us and are actually doing something about it as unwanted blight in our public spaces and would rather violate the First Amendment by restricting them. I ask you again, who does this serve? It doesn't serve the people overdosing and freezing to death outside. It doesn't serve union workers with either with the city or funded by it who will either be overworked from this 20page deluge or simply laid off when their work is given to volunteers. It doesn't serve the average Burlingtononian whether they're a college student, a new family, a retiree, people who are struggling to afford housing, health care, child care, groceries. They are watching their city council pay more attention to driving homeless people INTO THE LAKE THAN ANYTHING that would actually benefit the people of Burlington. So, who does that serve? [applause] The people who this resolution serves are those who seek to profit from the perception of a safer downtown. From business owners who cater more to wealthy tourists than those who actually live here to landlords and real estate firms trying to squeeze every dime out of people who want to call Burlington their home. Ignore that online shopping has crippled the small business model and out of greed their commercial landlords continue to raise rents on them with no reprieve. Ignore that the American tourist economy is dying because simply surviving is unaffordable. Ignore that capitalism created the drug crisis and has created a society of despair and neglect leading so many people to addiction and suffering. Ignore all that. So once again, those who have the least can be scapegoed and the rest of us continue to be ignored. That is who this was made for. It was not made for you and I because our society was not made for us. [applause] We are demanding a city, a state, and a country that works for everyone, that serves everyone equitably, no matter who they are or and how much wealth or capital they have. Stop punishing the unhoused for sleeping outside when there is no housing for their to live in. Stop punishing public drug use when there is no OPC. Stop punishing mutual aid for existing where the they are needed most. When people are starving and cold and have been forgotten by society except when they can be scapegoed for problems that are not their fault. Stop paring fear and appealing to the nostalgia of a past that no longer exists. We deserve better. We deserve a government that serves us and attacks the causes of poverty and addiction, not sweep away its effects. [applause] Yes, there is only so much the city can do. We do need the state to act. Tax the rich to fund healthcare. Build housing we can afford and shelters of all kinds. What our city can do is put people over profit today by rejecting this resolution [applause] by continuing to demand something different from this failing status quo. funding our housing trust fund, attempting to stabilize rents for residential and even commercial tenants, fund and support mutual aid, and stand up the OPC where it is needed most. A better world is possible, and [applause] we can achieve it by organizing and demanding an end to what has failed and fight for each other. Thank you. [applause] >> Thank you so much, Merrick. >> [applause] >> You want me to hold it for somebody? >> Oh. Oh, okay. I'm next. All right. >> Thanks, Bella. I didn't realize I was next. Um, good afternoon and, uh, thanks to everyone for being here. Uh, my name is Erhard Monka. I'm now retired. uh but spent most of my professional life working on housing, community development, and municipal affairs, including coordinating the former Vermont Affordable Housing Coalition for 25 years and serving as an outreach representative and housing policy adviser for Senator Bernie Sanders during the last three years of my career. As a 50-year resident of Burlington, as a former city councelor and city council president and longtime affordable housing advocate, I am deeply troubled by the Burlington forward resolution put forth at tonight's city council meeting. This is anything but Burlington moving forward. >> That's right. It puts Burlington squarely in the deplorable and regressive national trend of criminalizing homelessness as exemplified by President Trump's executive order on ending crime and disorder on American streets. hidden behind well-meaning terms like compassion, dignity, and meaningful support for individuals experiencing homelessness, substance use disorder, and behavioral health challenges is a dark current of stigmatization of people who are marginalized due to poverty, unhoused status, mental health disabilities, and addiction. Burlington is not alone in facing increased homelessness, especially unsheltered homelessness, inadequate services for those with mental health disabilities, and treatment for those with substance use disorder. Communities throughout Vermont, New England, and all over the country are facing the same issues that we face here in Burlington. Modern-day homelessness, as we've come to know it, let's remember this. Over the last 40 years, it began with drastic federal cutbacks to housing during the Reagan era. Cuts that have never been fully restored or replaced. Nationally, only a quarter of those people eligible for federal housing assistance actually receive it. It's no surprise that this is a major driver of homelessness in our community and around the country. Here in Vermont, we have seen a dramatic increase in homelessness since CO due to our chronic state underfunding of permanently affordable housing and successive waves of evictions from motel under the state's emergency housing program. For those of us who have worked in housing and homelessness for the last many years, the solutions are relatively simple. They are not rocket science. We need three things. First and foremost, more housing that is safe, stable, and affordable. Second, rent subsidies and other forms of financial assistance for the lowest income, most vulnerable Vermoners. And third, supportive services and case management for those with the greatest challenges to find and maintain housing. None of these solutions are adequately funded at the local, state, and federal levels to meet our community's needs. They are all embodied in the housing first model, which is the nationally recognized evidence-based practice for addressing long-term homelessness for people with mental health disabilities and often co-occurring substance use disorder. Let's truly embrace housing first and fully funded rather than scapegoat those who literally have nowhere to sleep at night or congregate during the day. Let's not scapegoat these folks for our economic challenges. >> [applause] >> Vermont and especially Burlington have a wellocumented housing affordability crisis. The National Low-Income Housing Coalition just released its annual out-ofreach report which pegs our area's housing wage at a shocking $41.15 an hour also or $85,600 a year for annual income. This is the amount needed to afford a modest two-bedroom apartment working 40 hours a week in our area. For a one-bedroom rental, the housing wage is a whopping $31.75 an hour or $66,000 for annual income. Compare this to the average annual income of some someone living on SSI disability income at $12,600 a year, which is an effective hourly wage of just over $6 an hour. >> That's not enough. >> It absolutely is not enough. And it makes the economics of homelessness come into very sharp focus for all of us. Someone living on disability income can afford no more than $315 for a month in for a month's rent, which is simply not possible without rental or other financial assistance. A few particularly disturbing elements in the proposed resolution implicit in the accountability record rhetoric in the resolution is that we can punish and incarcerate our way out of behaviors commonly and mistakenly associated with visible and unsheltered homelessness. Also implicit is the city is that the city's very partners in this struggle are social service providers and housers are partially being held responsible for concentrating homelessness in Burlington. The resolution asserts reasserts the thoroughly debunked claim that increased homelessness comes from out of state. It points to many solutions that are already happening and working but need far more resources and it points to them as though they were new and original ideas. Proposed sweeps and restrictions on encampments encampments are simply put inhumane. Where are people supposed to go when there is simply no housing that they can afford in Burlington? Proposed restrictions on the free distrib distribution of food not only undermine the type of volunteer mutual aid that people experiencing homelessness rely on for the basic for their basic needs, but they are an unconstitutional infringement on First Amendment rights which considered the free distribution of food a protected form of free speech. Proposed restrictions on the location of harm reduction measures like an overdose prevention center and needle exchange programs run counter to best practices recognized nationally. As a current Burlington planning commissioner, I will do everything in my power to make sure these facilities are enabled in our zoning ordinance where they will be most effective in or near downtown. Most disturbing of all, most disturbing of all, the resolution proposes public space response teams. These vigilante like uh volunteer organizations together with increased surveillance camera cameras are both absolutely chilling in an era of increased authoritarianism like the one that we're living through now. There should be no question whatsoever that we are all committed, quote, committed to safe public spaces, regional responsibility, public health, housing stability, and the dignity of every person in our community, as eloquently stated in CVOE's July 28th letter to the city council. As a community of well-intentioned people, why can't we work together, council, mayor, nonprofits, business community, and residents, rather than weaponizing the challenges that face Burlington and use them for political purposes? >> That's right. While none of us would condone criminal behavior and let it go unressed, let's not blame the victims of our current unrestrained and rapacious form of capitalism that puts profits over people, enables the greatest wealth and income disparity since the guilded age of the 1890s, and fails to tax the obscenely rich so we can adequately provide for the most vulnerable among us. To quote my former boss and our former mayor Bernie Sanders, "In the richest nation in the history of the world and here in Burlington, we can do better." [applause and cheering] >> Thank you, Hehart. I re I realize I have not been introducing people, so I'm going to introduce our next speaker, Ed Baker, who is an independent activist and runs the Addiction Recovery [music] Channel. >> [bell] >> I love the way that sounds. Every time I hear that, I think of our lost loved ones. My name is Ed Baker. I'm very pleased to be here with you. I'm a proud resident of the new North End. My wife and I have been living there since 2015. Before that, we lived in La Moy County, Marsville for over 20 years. >> I knew this was going to happen. Hold on one second. >> I'm proud to be a verter. Vermonters with severe substance use disorder and severe alcoholism saved my life. Stepped up and saved my life, loved me, took care of me until I got better 42 years ago. I will never ever [applause] forget that. And I will never ever turn my backs on them. Turn my back on them. >> [applause] >> I I'm a person uh with lived experience. I know what it means to live with severe and chaotic drug use disorder. I know what it means to inject drugs publicly in public restrooms. I know what it means to have abscesses, contract hepatitis. I know what it means to boost. Okay? I know what it means to be stabbed. I've been there. I've suffered the consequences of the severest drug use disorder, the war on drugs, stigma, and everything that comes with it. I also hold I've been in recovery for a long time. You can do a lot in a long time. I've also hold uh an undergraduate and graduate degree in social work from form university school of social services. I'm a fellow at Colombia University. I was the proud also in New York. I was a proud recipient of the Vermont Alliance for Mental Health and Addiction Recovery's um Jack Barry Award for Excellence in Recovery Advocacy. [applause] I'm here today. I'm here today and I'm going to ask you to help me. I'm here today to ask the city council members to say these names. These names are a small fraction of the people taken from us by what team sharing Vermont lovingly calls substance use passing. These names are the names of their children, their family members, their loved ones, their loving ones, their one and only ones that are gone. Aaron, Dan, Sha, Christina, Peter, Dustin, Tommy. >> Say these names with me. Aaron, >> Dan, >> Shan, >> Shawn, >> Christina, >> Peter, >> Dustin, >> Tommy, >> Tommy. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> City Council members, say these names. >> [applause] >> City Council members, own it. Own it. Feel it. Be it. Experience it. Before you cast your mighty ballot. Before you cast your mighty ballot, join us on August 31st at the head of Church Street at the First Unitarian Universalist Society. The beautiful gathering house at the the Head of Church Street on their campus. Join us August 31st from 5 to 7:00. See the plaqueards, the photos, the posters of loved ones taken from us by accidental drug overdose. Be with the parents, the the team sharing parents. Feel them, embrace them, hug them, feel their hearts beating in anguish, beating in loss, beating in torment, losses that could have been prevented. >> That's right. >> Losses that could have been and should be prevented. I looked up city council history last night. Since 2018, city council has been in favor of an overdose prevention center. State law mandates the creation of an overdose prevention center. The health department has de developed incredibly um stringent guidelines for the opening of an overdose prevention center. We've secured funds from the Sackler family and the opioid distributors through the opioid settlement advisory committee to fund the overdose prevention center. We have a staff the epitome of grace and respect, the epitome of experience for criminal justice reform willing and able to set up and staff the overdose prevention center. We have a community of neighbors living in Burlington willing to use the overdose prevention center as soon as it opens its doors. We have one death every two weeks right here in Chittenden County. And the city council is imposing upon this process added red tape, added hoops for what? For what? To gain the votes of their constituents that have been illucated and steeped in stigma propaganda for their entire lives. [applause] >> [applause] >> Say their names with me one more time. Erin >> Eric >> Dan >> Sean >> Christina >> Peter >> Dustin >> Tommy >> Thank you. [applause] >> Okay. Yeah. Thank you Ed so much. Um, I'm going to introduce Andre Andre Clark who is the lead organizer with Street Cats Burlington. Hi everyone. Uh, my name is Andre Clark. Um, I experienced homelessness and housing insecurity off and on from the ages of 13 until 25. I drank alcohol from the ages of 13 until I was 25. It is not an accident that my sobriety came after I finally had stable housing and the education and employment opportunities needed to maintain it. I was only able to find that housing opportunity because a professor at UVM, Garrison Nelson, connected me with a property manager he knew. I was only able to afford that opportunity because my friends moved in with me. Throughout my life, there have been people who have helped me, who believed in me, and who supported me. Even when I did not deserve it. Even when I was making bad choices, misusing alcohol, and taking part in unlawful and disruptive activities, people still saw the good in me. They still gave me food, let me crash on their couch, spent time with me, and treated me with dignity and respect. [applause] If I had been written off, criminalized, and cut off from my social support networks, I would likely be drunk right now, sleeping outside and filled with despair. I don't think the general public understands how dehumanizing it is to be homeless, to have people stare at you, judge you, and be visibly afraid of you before they know anything about you. I hear people talk about our unhoused neighbors now in the same way I worried people would talk about me. I am concerned that some of the language and ideas in the Burlington Ford resolution will deepen stigma against and unfairly target our unhoused neighbors and the organizations and neighbors who exist in community with them. The resolution is heavily reliant on enforcement, removal, and punitive measures against people who use substances, are unhoused, or who make people feel uncomfortable. Burlington Ford uses coded language like required permits and unpermitted social services to say that mutual aid organizations should leave City Hall Park. We aren't going anywhere. [applause] The resolution implies that neighbors sharing food and resources encourages problematic or unlawful behavior. The resolution calls for a volunteer coalition made up of city staff and members from unidentified local organizations to address and intercede conduct that unreasonably interferes with the public's use and enjoyment of Burlington's public spaces. I have deep concerns about the use of non-professional volunteers and their ability, even with training, to equitably interpret and enforce laws and regulations. We should rely on trained and qualified professionals to protect public safety and connect people to appropriate resources. [applause] I have spent the past 10 years working in homeless services, studied homelessness in UVM's Master of Public Health program, and currently lead a mutual aid organization, Street Cats Burlington, that supports the unhoused community through outreach, advocacy, and supply drives. [applause] I don't claim to have all of the answers, but I do know that stigmatizing, criminalizing, or displacing people is not an effective long-term strategy. We need collaborative and person- centered approaches that focus on the social determinance of health. This means safe and accessible housing for everyone, access to nutritional food, safe and welcoming parks, and positive social connections. These are some of the areas of support that mutual aid and nonprofit agencies provide people every day. I believe this resolution would be more effective if it went through a process that more thoroughly engaged the community, including those with living and lived experience of homelessness and drug use. [applause] Social service agencies working directly with people experiencing homelessness and people who use drugs. and members of mutual aid organizations. There are real gaps in our system of care that are preventing people from access accessing substance use treatment, employment, housing, and emergency shelter. We need to talk to those who understand where the gaps are and provide additional support and resources to help fill those gaps and meet the need of our community. I hope you guys will join us in supporting this. Thank you. [applause] >> Thanks, Andre. Now I'm going to introduce Brenda Seagull to End Homelessness Vermont. >> Hi, I'm Brenda Seagull. I'm the executive director of End Homelessness Vermont. And I I want to start by just offering you two more names and asking you to say them with me. Something I have never done. Thank you for that. Ka >> ka >> and Jonathan >> Jonathan >> ka >> was my nephew who is my nephew who died of an overdose in 2018 after a year in recovery because Vermont did not have the support that they need that we he needed to survive. That year in recovery came from love and compassion. true compassion, not the word compassion. >> Yeah. >> And his death came after an experience of shame and stigma. His relapse and his death came then. And if he had been in an overdose prevention center that night, he would have survived. [applause] My brother, Kaia's father, died 20 years before him. We didn't know that he was struggling. We didn't know as much as we do about harm reduction. Both of them suffered from bipolar. Both of them didn't have the support and treatment they needed 20 years apart in our state. And going backwards is not an option, just as we've reduced overdose deaths in this state. >> THAT'S RIGHT. >> [applause] >> WE WERE WALKING THROUGH today because I live down south. Our organization is statewide and we work primarily with people living with disabilities. We were walking through today. Many of the people experiencing unsheltered homeless homelessness right now are our clients living with disabilities. And I want to tell you something. This uptick in unsheltered homelessness is not because people are doing something wrong. It is because our state is perpetually unsheltering them. [applause] >> People are running out of their allotted days in shelter, ending up outside in your communities, and hearing nothing but shame and stigma. >> That's right. Last week, we had a client who we found out was being trafficked and she was afraid to talk to the police because she was afraid of how she would be viewed. >> Shame. >> We have a CL and they were being trafficked by a business owner. So, I want to just say that that does not say anything about all the business owners, but it was someone in power, not another person, not someone from out of state, someone who has owned a business for a very long time in our state. But they can't do anything unless that person and other people will talk to the police and they are afraid to because of this kind of stigma that this proposal has. And so I'm going to read a little bit about something that I said the other day. What's happening right now is a tragedy. Not because we should illegally force treatment on people who need housing and are suffering and dying themselves. By the way, disability awareness month just ended. That is illegal to do that to people. But because we in Vermont are unsheltering people at rapid speed and it is increasing that suffering, it is a tragedy because it is not the fault of the people experiencing homelessness and they are being talked about in a way that causes them shame and their struggle to be worse. It is a tragedy because our state should not be allowing unsheltered homelessness to grow so exponentially. We should be doing more. We should be doing more. It's us. [applause] The call is coming from inside the house. It is a tragedy because no one none of us should be subject to this level of suffering around them. None of us should be having this experience at all. It is a tragedy because about a month ago, a client on oxygen in this city died sleeping in her car and another is hospitalized. Now, it is a tragedy because people in wheelchairs are being forced to crawl into the woods to hide from forced encampment cleanups. Crawl into the woods. That is how we are treating our disabled community. It is a tragedy because people with met metastatic cancer are dying. They're being forced to live their last few days outside in a tent with no one around. The tragedy is real, but the facts of that tragedy fly in the face of the messaging put being put out under a thin veil of supposed compassion. But none of the above, none of this is the fault of the human beings in these encampments. This is state sanctioned violence of marginalized and disabled people. >> That's right. state sanctioned violence. [applause] It is a tragedy because it's being talked about in the guise of compassion. I work every single day with these wonderful human beings who are experiencing homelessness. And I want to just say you are missing out if you don't take the opportunity to get to know the people who in your community who are suffering because these are some of the best most incredible people I have ever met in my entire life. [applause] The the flawed messaging follows neither data or science. Those of you that know me know that I am big on the data and science. In fact, we are in the middle of re releasing research that includes that only 4% of the people experiencing homelessness who were in the hotel and motel program even came from out of state at all. And when they did, it was because they came for a job, they came for family, or they came for fleeing domestic domestic violence. And that matched the Agency of Human Services data in that same time frame. So that is a outright lie. >> That's right. [applause] But you can wrap this in whatever words you want. It's not compassion. >> That's right. >> Violent crime has decreased in Burlington. Suffering has increased. What you are feeling is discomfort of seeing others suffering. And what you are feeling is fear of people who are suffering. [applause] The reason for the increase of encampments is that while the new statute passed the legislature allows for an extension of allowed shelter days, the department for children and families, the administration is pretending that that extension isn't there yet. And they've now created extraordinary bureaucratic and invasive hurdles that are going to be implemented on those extensions against the statute and against the law. The reason for this increase in encampments is the reduced number of shelter beds. We have clients who are being threatened and trafficked not by others experiencing homelessness but by business owners as I said and people in power and they're afraid to speak up and they are being left into that situation because they believe no one will believe them. People without power over people with power. The recent discourse which had improved was driven back to this disturbing tone by this proposal and that really bothers me because it has taken a long time to get to where we see this differently and now it's going back to that same horrible tone. >> That's right. [applause] Should those with the least among us be made to feel like they should be locked up or hide in the shadows so that those with privilege do not have the fe to feel the discomfort of state sanctioned suffering? Or should we shelter people until they are permanently housed which solves two problems? Because the data is decidedly clear that housing is a homelessness problem. I mean homelessness is a housing problem. Let's start that again. The data is decidedly clear that homelessness is a housing problem. [applause] And I want to end by saying this. There is no amount of shame, stigma, attacks on people experiencing homelessness that will end the crisis. And no, it is not concentrated in Burlington. We are across the state. And it is in every community. And every community is saying that exact same thing. every community at their select board me meetings at their city councils is saying it's concentrated here. They're all here. >> No, where they are is everywhere >> and we're at those meetings. So, we know that's what's being said. If we want to solve the problem, we will work together in a loving and compassionate way. We have seen people die, a lot of them, and we have seen a lot of people get housed. We have a 97.5% housing retention rate. You know why we have that? Because we don't go away. We support people and we never ever ever give up on them or turn them away. And I ask all of you to never do that because at one point I was a person in poverty not so long ago. I'm here with staff who were experiencing homelessness. That shame keeps you silent. That shame keeps you from speaking up. So, be better as a community. I'm asking the city council to be better tonight. [applause] Thank you, Brenda. We have one more speaker. Um, Skyler, where are you? There you are. Skyler from Pathways. >> Hi, everyone. Thank you for being here. My name is Skyler Kelly. I am a nurse at Pathways Vermont. Keep bringing it down. Pathways mission is to provide community-based mental health services and collaborative learning that center people as the experts of their own lives. We strengthen our communities and the system of care by elevating the voices of lived experience. Our organization runs the largest permanent supportive housing program in the state because we know housing is healthcare. We also run several other programs that support people in various ways with their mental health with the focus on elevating lived experience and intentional peer support. We operate under three major values: choice, connection, and community. It is because of our grounding in our values. We are extremely disappointed to read the Burlington Forward statement put forth by Democrats on the city council. Like our partners at the Vermont Harm Reduction Advocates, we are very concerned about the hurdles this proposes to both the overdose prevention center and the syringe service program. Our city councilors claim to be supportive of public health initiatives, but use this document to put hurdles in place to prevent the operation of these two evidence-based interventions. As a public health nurse who works daily with those who use substances, I can tell you without a doubt that this will make it harder for people to access the care they need. I would also like to note the irony of bemoning public drug use while at the same time standing against an overdose prevention center [applause] which would provide a safe, clean, resourced place to use drugs out of the public eye. Beyond the OPC and our and the syringe service program, we are concerned with several other sections. The accountability and enforcement section. The writers of this section would like us to believe that accountability is compassion. That may be true in its broadest sense, but what the counselors are proposing is akin to the notoriously failed war on drugs. >> That's right. >> One of the largest policy failures our country has ever seen. The war on drugs and its subsequent mass incarceration has created health disparities that will take us decades to undo. Drug use should be treated with public health efforts and medical care, not with citations, fines, increased surveillance, and incarceration. The resources that exist in our state to support those using drugs are severely limited. There are only two rehab centers for the whole state that accept Medicaid and of course a handful of others that are wildly out of reach for those on a limited income. This is not enough to address the problem and yet individual drug users are being blamed for their use. We are also concerned about the section on unauthorized encampments. This resolution makes clear that our city councilors would prefer to have all unhoused people out of our downtown public spaces. Though downtown is a tourist and shopping destination, it is also a place where all of our public resources have been centralized. People gather here because this is where they can most easily access resources when they are without money and without transportation. Moving unhoused people to the periphery of these spaces will not make the problem go away. >> The city councilors proposed sanctioned campsites, but proposed no specifics about where these would be. Where then will unhoused folks go? To neighborhoods where no resources exist? To neighborhoods where residents are sure to protest the presence of their unhoused neighbors? Indeed, it is a dehumanizing message. One that says, "Your presence makes us uncomfortable and we do not want to see you. Or worse, your presence is affecting commerce and the money we could make and we want you gone." The resolution put forth by city councilors want to dismantle what they say is a false binary. That accountability and safety are not mutually exclus exclusive to care and compassion. At Pathways, we agree with this sentiment. We just disagree with the proposed solution. To get a safer, more inviting downtown, we do not need more police presence, surveillance, and interaction with the criminal justice system. We need to provide people with what they need, housing, jobs, and care that is rooted in connection, choice, and community. I urge you to oppose this resolution in its current form and join the coalition of us working towards meaningful solutions that do not treat the city's most vulnerable as criminals. Thank you. [applause] >> Thank you, folks. We have one more speaker in our last five minutes. I'm going to hand the mic over to Milo Central District. >> Thank you. >> I I I'll be Hey, thank you all for being here. Thank you all for being here. I don't have anything planned to say. I'm just going to throw some things out to think about. I became a police commissioner in 2020. So, I've had a city email address since 2020. And I have emails going back to them then from residents who were living next to trap houses, drug dens, drug houses, flop houses, whatever you want to call them. Huge quality of life issues. And anyone can do this. You can look up where the major busts have occurred and you will find that most of them have occurred in the old north end. There was a certain intentionality of not addressing drug trafficking in our neighborhood. When I decided to run for council, even though in my life I voted Prague, but I also voted Democratic, I considered myself an independent. I came to the progressive party intentionally because this was the only party talking about the issues that were affecting the one I continued to notice a lot of classism and right now it's kind of open class warfare. Some of the language being used >> is not okay. The language that's being used is evisive and we have certain counselors quite frankly that are very comfortable lying to people, misleading people, lying about data, lying about um or or just ignoring root causes. What has concerned me is that the equity issues, probably because of what's also happening at the federal level, continue to widen here. I've never been one to say defund the police. I have said that oversight and accountability are important and I have said bringing in different positions that can help people who are homeless who can help people struggling with mental health because you would hear it all the time from officers. They didn't have the training to deal with the large number of mental health incidents that they were running into. What continues to be profoundly unfair and ultimately ineffective is the fact that we would look at the contract that we give our police officers and they're entitled to a fair contract. But when we look at what we pay them versus what we pay our social workers who are consistently burnt out and we have a lot of high turnover, that's the real thing. We don't respect those jobs in our community. And I think we have to not mislead people. A lot of people haven't read that document. If you haven't had a chance to read all 21 pages, you need to read all 21 pages because there are things that are actually already going on. When we got to such a bad place, everybody knows someone who had to file an online complaint to the police department and never got a response, right? Everyone knows someone that that needed help and didn't get it. Our businesses didn't get a response to retail theft. We have a different interimm police chief now that is fixing some of those things. But it didn't get bad overnight and it's not going to get fixed overnight. There is no perfect solution. There isn't you know that that uh what do they say? silver bullet that just doesn't exist. So to say and try to pretend that nothing is going on is deeply offensive and it's not true. We have seen incremental change, but none of the social service agencies, not the city, not all the various mutual aid groups that we have with hundreds of volunteers that give their time, no one has ever had enough money or resources. So when people say, "Oh, harm reduction is this bad thing. Harm reduction isn't working." They don't understand what harm reduction is. It is for everyone. It is to improve everyone's quality of life. But if you don't have the funding and the resources, you can't accomplish what needs to be accomplished. And that's where we are. We all know what's happening at the federal level. We know that that housing vouchers have been and Brenda will tell you about that all day every day. Housing vouchers being taken away from people midstream when they've been promised for a whole year. That destabilizes people. Everyone assumes that homeless people are all substance use. And that's not true either. Working people are losing their housing. So I just need people to think about these things, to think about the truth, to think about how we talk to and about each other and to make sure that that the truth matters. And I think that's the most frustrating thing right now where where the truth doesn't matter. Like what was the term one of the counselors used? They called it progressive compassion. Like compassion should not be affiliated with a political party. It should not be political to help people. [applause] And that is where I'll leave it. Thank you all so much. [applause] Thank you all so much for joining us. Um we are going to take instead of we are run the the time is running out before our city council meeting which starts at 6. So we are going to take questions privately. Um give city councilors a time to go in and settle. This is also a really great time for press to go in to our city council meeting and settle in the city council meeting. This is on the deliberative agenda. So if you as a I see so many incredible advocates out here. I recognize all these incredible faces of people who really care about the people in our community. Please sign up for public forum. You've got three I think three maybe two. Two minutes. Two minutes. You've got two minutes to say your piece. I'm happy to help anyone put anything together. Thank you all so much for coming. And I'm gonna hand the mic over to Kase Hudman who's going to take over for the community rally portion. Thank you all so much for coming. We appreciate it. [applause] Hello everybody. Um I did I did plan a speech here. Um >> hi everybody. My name is Kase. Um, you might know me from the peace and justice center or you might know me from food not cops maybe. Um, today I am really tired and really weary because yet again because this isn't the first time we have the Burlington City Council proposing a resolution that spends an awful lot of time, money, and resources exclusively on going after our most vulnerable and poor residents and neighbors. Yet again, we have a city council resolution attacking the miracle that is food not cops and free food distribution in the park. Since the city council can't seem to do it, let me say the only two words that should that need to be said to all the food. Cops volunteers and organizers that are here, thank you so much. Um, this resolution might call you unpermitted and unlicensed social service providers. But I know that you all are actually visionaries and revolutionaries and people who dare to dream of a world where nobody goes hungry, where money isn't wasted on weapons of war, where food is not a commodity to be bought and sold, but something to be shared with everyone. And you don't just dare to dream it. You've actually built it. Every cook night is a is a vision of a world that I never thought was possible. Well, every dis dro is a dream come true. Um, you are the best of Burlington and we we've done six and a half years of free food in the park. Here's to 60 more years of food not cops. Thank you. Um, now back to this Burlington Forward resolution. Uh, this resolution is particularly ridiculous because it keeps using the word accountability, but it never asks for accountability from the people who actually created this crisis. Let me be clear. At root, this is a housing crisis. Within two blocks of where we're standing right now, there is at least 40,000 square feet of abandoned commercial property that has been abandoned for more than a year, sometimes a decade, just sitting there empty. The people who own those buildings could end the housing crisis right now if they wanted to. They would just have to open up those buildings and let people stay in them or redevelop them and turn them into affordable housing, sell them to Champlne Housing Trust, do something with them. But they haven't done anything with them for ever. And we're just sitting there with empty buildings downtown. [laughter] >> And they're like, "Oh, wow. You can't afford anything. This is the only land you can ever develop in Burlington." >> That's right. Oh, $2 billion. [laughter] >> So, I'm going to ask the city council, where is the accountability for the people who actually caused the crisis? Why aren't you demanding accountability from the commercial landlords for the crisis they caused and are still causing? City Council, if you are serious about accountability, you will abandon this proposed resolution against our poorest and most vulnerable neighbors, and you will instead demand accountability from the people who could actually end this, the rich commercial property owners. Thank you so much. [cheering] [applause] >> Um, I think next up, I think Fared was going to talk. Is Fared here somewhere? Fared with People's Kitchen. Here we go. >> Thank you. Um, just really quick, if you're sick of these things happening of like people who dominate the city council setting the the rules for our city, we are fighting back. We are going to bring initiative, referendum, and uh advisory questions uh for the ballot to Burlington voters. Right now, Burlington is the only city and the only town in Vermont that doesn't give this power to its voters. I think this is this is how we can pass. we can propose and pass um all these wonderful things that we know needs to happen but has been uh but have been put put to the table every time the city council is presented by it or out outright rejected. So please if you can help us please sign our petition let's bring people power to Burlington. We are also looking for volunteers uh for the primary if you you can donate to ours. We need volunteers to collect signature petitions. If you could get to 2,000 signatures, we'll be voting on this in November. That's the plan. We're going to get this in the November ballot. So, thank you very much. >> Let the people speak. Also, um I think it's ironic that the the council Democrats has identified accountability as the problem and offered as the solution for Lincoln Police Department. [laughter] >> T Hi, I'm Tess. I'm a local juggler here in town. Uh, and I kind of wanted to talk about Burlington Forward a little bit. Um, I [clears throat] compare it to the diet rights of Project 2025. Um, it doesn't do anything to really help the LGBTQ community. A lot of us are trans here in Burlington. A lot of us are trans here in Vermont. And if you're going to criminalize homelessness, how are people going to be able to come up here from more dangerous areas? How are we going to be able to protect our LGBTQ neighbors if we are trying to profile what [music] people can do within humanitarian rights on our streets? Um, it it's it's bad. It it it genuinely shocked me when I found out that the Burlington Democrats try to do this every single like every few years. They'll name it something else. They'll change it from Burlington FWD to a few years later saying the entire word Burlington forward. Criminalizing the homeless does absolutely nothing. The town can't exist just for real estate developers and business owners. How else are they going to pay for the businesses themselves? How else are they going to pay for the thousands of houses they own if their renters can't afford to live here? Um, this is a direct descent right into fascism, uh, kind of plain and simply. And I hate to see that this is kind of what is happening uh, right here in a town that is supposed to be here for a leader um, and all this stuff we're seeing in the nation. And Burlington wants to pretend that we're a bubble, that we're away from this. What these seven people on this Burlington City Council have proposed is just beating down on the homeless. It's beating down on people that can't afford any of this. So again, I'm just a juggler, but I don't really think beating up the homeless is a good thing. Do we have a Vivven Bose pin? >> Vavon. >> After Vavon is going to be Ray and then Leaf. >> Yo, just super quick. I think everybody should hop on public comment today. I I want to start shout out. There's three Democrats hiding back over there. City councilors. They're really afraid of people, right? That's what was kind of the point of the resolution. Let's Let's just make sure that we have some universal language about it, right? They're afraid of homeless people, right? >> Those Yep. I think I should all three of them because they're all advocating for an anti- poor anti-homeless bill that makes them all racist. Um to be clear, to be clear, get some common language down. We're talking about the Burlington backwards bill. It's 6.5. Definitely sign up. Even if you just want to say a quick little note about it, that's that's definitely welcome. Let them know that you feel more safe with unhoused neighbors than you do with them putting a bunch of surveillance cameras. They want to cover the entirety of the Burlington, whatever development district with surveillance cameras. That's what they think is going to make people feel safer. So, just make sure that even if you're if you don't have something eloquent to say, you could just say that and that's plenty. So, grab a public comment card. I got some here. There's more inside. Um, and let's let's tell them what we feel today cuz they're doing the most dangerous Trump put out all that antihomless with his executive orders and he was really really clear about it. He said no no junkies. They say and junkies are fine, just not here. We want them a little bit further away. We like there's there's too many here in Burlington. Yeah, that's really dangerous. We can't let that slide. We have got to make them say what they're going to say if they want to try to push this forward and then we're going to block it. Okay. If you believe that the people have the power, then you believe that they are only only gain that power back when they silence us. Right. I really I got to implore everybody to speak. Um so please come grab a card, grab them inside. Non Burlington residents, welcome. Flood the comments. I want them here until about 2 a.m. Then they can go home to their houses that they have safe that we're >> that close behind them. >> Well, exactly. Then, and I'm going to just say this right now, is that we are not threatening to clean up their houses and throw them into the trash can. But if they keep threatening to do that to all of our neighbors, then I don't I don't know, maybe we will. [cheering] >> All power to the people, Ray. Stay tuned. Thank you. >> Hi y'all. >> Hi Rick. >> Hi. >> How are we doing today? I'm glad the rain let up. My name is Ray and I'm with Food Not Bombs and People's Kitchen and Street Cats and every other mutual aid you can think of because I love everybody. Thank you for being here. A year ago, many of us stood here because Burlington was talking about public safety. A year later, we're back in the same place having the same conversation. This re resolution, Burlington Forward. Look at the people standing here. There are people who cook meals. There are people who hand out tents. There are people who carry cases of water through the summer heat and blankets through the winter snow. The These are the people who know our unhoused neighbors by name. These are the people who show up not once and not when the cameras are rolling, but every single day. Food Not Bombs has shown up every day for more than five years, almost six now. Every single day. No city contract, no paycheck, no profit, just neighbors refusing to let other neighbors go hungry. And after all that time, the question we're still asked isn't how can we help, it's how do we make this less visible? That's the wrong question. The problem has never been about people sharing food. The problem has been about unhoused people existing in public. The problem is the is that in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, thousands of people still rely on volunteers to just survive. You can't build a stronger community by pushing pe poor people out of sight. You cannot create public safety by treating poverty like a nuisance. You cannot move people out of downtown and call that progress. Real public safety starts with housing. It starts with health care. It starts with food. And it starts with dignity. Because when somebody is hungry, the safest thing you can do is feed them. And when someone is freezing, the safest thing you can do is give them a blanket. >> When someone is been ignored by the rest of society, the safest thing you can do is remind them that they matter and they exist. And that's what Food Mop Bombs has always done. Tonight, as city council debates Burlington Forward, I hope they remember this. You don't build a stronger community by protecting people from seeing poverty. You build a stronger community by ending poverty. Until that day comes, we're going to keep doing what we've always done and we'll keep cooking. We'll keep sharing. We'll keep showing up. And we'll keep standing with our neighbors because every person defer deserves food, dignity, and a place in this community. Thank you. >> Is our friend leave? Hello. Can you hear me? Okay. Um, I'm Leaf. I use they them pronouns. I live in the Old North End and I'm part of an abolitionist safety network. Uh, we don't super have a name, but if we have to have a name, we call ourselves the Solidarity Safety Net. And we're a bunch of folks, mostly marginalized folks. Most of us are trans andor black and brown andor disabled andor mentally ill andor a lot of those things at once. Um and what we do is we try to just go out and make sure that our neighbors and loved ones are taken care of and safe. Uh we think of safety as everybody's needs being met and everybody having a sense of belonging. That is, you know, if you go by that definition, the Democrats are right about one thing, which is that Burlington is not a very safe place. There are a lot of bigots around here, including on the city council, who are trying to stop people's bodily autonomy, trying to stop um people from being able to exist here, trying to stop people from belonging. And when we're doing deescalation work as part of this network, we do see a lot of violence in the community. This violence looks like bigots pointing guns at us, uh, pointing machetes at us, trying to run us over with cars. It looks like people freezing to death. It looks like people overdosing because someone thought it was politically convenient for them to overdose instead of for them to survive. There is a lot of violence here and none of it is being perpetuated by the people that this resolution is scapegoating and trying to punish. Um, it's just absolute nonsense. People keep saying, "Oh no, I don't feel safe walking around in Burlington." It's like, neither do I dress like this. a lot of the time, but the fa place I feel the safest is on Church Street when my homeless neighbors are watching my back. That is when I'm safe. It is not in city council with a whole bunch of cops staring at us from over there. Uh it is not when ICE agents are allowed to walk around and the police are helping them. It's when we're taking care of each other. And so all this nonsense about progress and oh we're going to make everything. It's you're just putting bigotry and then putting a whole bunch of branding and fancy flyers on it. Like we're not going to fall for that. nonsense. So, uh I hope you all also go to public comment and also if they pass this nonsense that is one, let's not let them pass it. They're not going to do it. We're going to stop them. Also, if they do, you all are already making the solution to all of this. And we're just going to have to make these people's roles obsolete. Like, they have no right to be making these decisions and hurting everybody. So, we're going to have to keep making the solution without them. Keep taking care of each other. uh make it so that they cannot be hurting everybody anymore. Um and I hope you will do that and you are so great. Uh and they are not at all nearly as powerful and wonderful and caring for the community as all of you. Okay, the end. All right, let's do public comment, y'all. Woohoo. So, go sign up.