On the afternoon of Oct. 12, Burlington, Vermont Mayor Miro Weinberger led media on a tour of an emergency shelter pod community that is being constructed just north of the city’s downtown.
On December 16, 2021, Burlington’s Democratic mayor issued a five-year ten-point action plan to address homelessness in the city. The fifth item proposed to “Invest in approximately 30 shelter pods and related infrastructure to create a new low-barrier facility...”
In February, the city council approved the use of $1.5 million in American Rescue Plan Act money for the project and additional funding for an on-site community resource center.
Burlington’s Community Works Assistant Director Samantha Dunn has been managing the development of the former parking lot at 51 Elmwood Avenue.
“We've been getting the site ready. We got City Council approval to use this site in March, went through the permitting process and started site work in August. It's a temporary project meant to be here for three years. It's going to be able to be reutilized in different locations," noted Dunn. "On this site there'll be 30 shelters. Twenty-five of them you see here. There's five additional shelters coming from a local manufacturer and they will be here by the end of next month and then two additional buildings will provide six full bathrooms with shower facilities, and then a community space to serve residents on-site with offices, service, provisions, kitchen, laundry, things like that. And those buildings will arrive next month as well.”
The pods currently being assembled were delivered on Tuesday from Everett, Washington-based Pallet Inc., which manufactures and assembles the 64- and 100-square-foot shelters. Manager of Community Development Ben Simons expected the 25 insulated pods to be fully assembled by the end of the day. Mayor Weinberger and Simons led the group to one of the completed structures.
“These are pretty unique structures.” quips Mayor Weinberger.
Simons nods, “Yeah.”
“So," continues Weinberger, "you got the outsides all set up yesterday?”
“Yep.”
“You want to lead people through what's in each unit?”
“Yeah." Simons enters a pod. "You’ve got to squeeze in here. It’s a little dark. We don’t have power yet so we don’t have the light on. Each shelter does have a locking door with two keys and a master key that the site manager will have. And of course a bunk and a mattress is so important when we're providing someone with a dignified shelter space. Openable, lockable windows also very important for ventilation and for quality of life.”
The Mayor notes, “It's heated and cooled by a heat pump unit.”
“This unit only has heat," clarifies Ben Simons. "This is a 4500-watt heater. We do have the option for air conditioning that would go up the top there that can be installed after the fact.”
“Now," the mayor asks, "these also can be taken down and reused, right?”
“Yep, we can take this down in about half an hour, 45 minutes," explains Simons. "Or you can pick it up with a forklift and put on a flatbed truck and just move it across town.”
After the tour, Mayor Weinberger said the project is a key piece of the city’s larger strategy to end homelessness.
“This is a critical project right now because we're facing unprecedented homelessness challenges. We've never in recent memory had more than 200 people who were chronically homeless. We've never had a situation where we have around 70 people in Burlington sleeping outside every night. This is an emergency facility designed to address that acute concern right now," explains Mayor Weinberger. "You know, I believe in this whole built-for-zero approach that we are taking to get back to where we were before the pandemic when we had very, many fewer people living outside, many fewer chronically homeless people than we do today. And then go beyond that and ensure that homelessness is really rare and brief when it does happen here in Chittenden County.”
City of Burlington Special Assistant to End Homelessness Sarah Russell says a number of providers will be providing on-site case management services.
“There'll be one and a half full-time positions here who will be working with people who are staying to determine what barriers we may have to helping them to enter housing and moving forward toward mental health supports, medical supports and any kind of substance use challenges they may have as well. As well as connection to resources and we’re working on other partnerships to bring services to the site so that people can access services here.”
Five additional two-person shelters and two common buildings will be delivered in November. Underground power has yet to be connected to the shelters. Landscaping is also planned.
The Champlain Housing Trust has been contracted to manage the emergency shelter community. City officials hope the site will open by December 1.
