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In Vermont, approximately 1,700 eviction cases are filed every year. The number one cause of eviction is falling behind on rent. In most cases, families lose their housing, leading to increased rates of homelessness, unemployment, mental and physical illness, and financial and housing instability.

On January 16, 2019, Vermont Legal Aid released a report, Eviction in Vermont: A Closer Look, examining the problem and calling for policy solutions to reduce evictions and the deepening poverty caused by them.

This report marks the most comprehensive attempt to date to study evictions in Vermont. Its key findings are as follows:

In the report, the voices of tenants explain how eviction is a kind of accelerant for poverty: it comes out of poverty, and it creates even more. Research has shown that even a year after eviction, parents and children are more likely to suffer from depression, stress, and negative health outcomes than their non-evicted peers. Eviction can significantly damage a tenant’s subsequent employment, housing and credit prospects.

For landlords, evictions reflect a loss in rental income, lost time in court, and a financial cost for court and attorney fees. Evictions also cost Vermont taxpayers resources through additional burden on the court system and, when an eviction leads to homelessness, through funds needed for emergency housing and shelters. Taking a more proactive approach to prevent evictions would save money for landlords and taxpayers.

The report recommends the following policy changes to address this issue:

“Taken together, we believe that these recommendations would reduce Vermont’s rate of evictions and homelessness and prevent the hardships that occur for both landlords and tenants when a tenancy is terminated,” said Vermont Legal Aid Staff Attorney Jessica Radbord, who is one of the authors of the report. Follow this link to download the full report and recommendations.

Old criminal records prevent many Vermonters from obtaining jobs, housing or educational opportunities.

If you have a past criminal conviction, or a charge that has been dismissed, you may want to figure out whether you can “expunge” your criminal record. Through the expungement process, the State of Vermont allows for specific convictions and dismissed charges to be wiped from your record after a certain amount of time has passed. There are a couple of different sealing or expungement laws, and the requirements are a bit different for each.

See our web page about Sealing or Expunging Your Criminal Record in Vermont for information on this topic, free expungement clinics, and how to reach us for help.

The Green Mountain Care Board is reviewing proposed health insurance premium price increases for individual and small employer plans including Vermont Health Connect plans. (Small employers have less than 100 employees.) These plans cover nearly 80,000 Vermonters.

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont is asking to increase premium prices by 7.5%, on average, for 2019. MVP Health Care is asking to increase premium prices by 10.9% on average. The price increases vary by plan.

Vermonters who get subsidies to help with premium prices may pay more or less in 2019 than in 2018. Changes to subsidized Vermonters’ premium prices are mostly based on changes in income, family size and which plan they choose during the next open enrollment. If you have questions about premium prices, contact the Office of the Health Care Advocate.

The Green Mountain Care Board will decide whether to change the premium prices for 2019. You can tell the board what you think they should do. Visit our How the Public Can Participate page for details on the public hearings and how to submit public comments to the board online, by mail or by phone. Your comments will be part of the public record. 

The Green Mountain Care Board must consider public comments when setting the 2019 premium prices. The public comment period ends July 25, 2018.

If you have questions about your health insurance, health care or about how you can give a public comment, contact the Office of the Health Care Advocate.

Renters at Risk: The Cost of Substandard Housing

Despite regulations intended to protect them from substandard housing conditions, many Vermont tenants still live in unsafe and unhealthy homes. Today, Vermont Legal Aid released a report, Renters at Risk: The Cost of Substandard Housing, to examine the problem and call for policy solutions to address substandard housing.

The report was the result of data analysis and interviews with tenants, advocates, and public officials. Our key findings are as follows.

1. Tenants who suffer from the various impacts of unsafe and unhealthy housing conditions experience increased health care usage, mental health problems, disruption to school and work, and homelessness.

2. The most common problems tenants face are pests and plumbing problems.

3. Threat of eviction and lack of affordable housing options often prevent tenants from reporting rental housing health code violations.

4. Town health officers are commonly unpaid volunteers without the time or experience necessary to address health code violations.

5. We can and should make changes to our code enforcement system.

In our report, the voices of nine tenants in the struggle for healthy housing reveal the long-lasting impacts of substandard housing. It is clear that their experiences with inadequate housing conditions are not isolated instances – many other renters throughout Vermont suffer serious problems in their rented homes. For example, Amberly, a tenant in Rutland, had to live with a severe rat infestation (see attached photo). It appeared that they were coming into her home from the outside through the basement.  Amberly set traps and did what she could, but had to live with rats -- in her home, in her kitchen, chewing on her possessions – for months before she could move out. Amberly developed hives and other medical issues in addition to handling the plain stress of a rat infesation, all while trying to juggle work and raising two small children.

“This kind of situation is too common, and it is not just a problem for tenants,” according to Maryellen Griffin, one of the attorneys at Vermont Legal Aid who worked with lead author Tessa Horan on the report. “These problems also hurt good landlords, towns, and taxpayers. The medical costs, the downward pressure on property values, the risk that the rats will continue to multiply and migrate to other buildings, not to mention the human suffering – these are problems for all of us.  Allowing our housing stock to continue to degrade threatens the health of our residents as well as the tax base and the viability and vibrancy of our towns.”

We are proposing legislation to address this issue using three strategies:

1. Strengthen Town Health Officers’ authority to issue orders and enforce them, and make it unlawful to re-rent an apartment if the landlord has not complied with the orders.

2. Direct the Department of Health to provide more coordinated support to Town Health Officers.

3. Create a statewide database of rental housing to collect better data about the problem.

As Jonathan Bond from Vermont Tenants Inc. said in the report, “If we’re going to have a really basic health code, I would like to see the basic health code being enforced, and right now it’s just not being enforced.”

To read our full report and list of recommendations to address the impacts of substandard housing on Vermont tenants, visit our website at http://www.vtlegalaid.org/renters-at-risk.