CVOEO and Champlain Housing Trust seek location for new year-round 100-bed emergency shelter

Read the full article at MiltonIndependent.com. Below is an excerpt.

VERMONT — The Champlain Valley Office of Economic Opportunity and Champlain Housing Trust are seeking a site where they can establish a 100-bed emergency shelter. The organizations invite community members, business leaders and real estate professionals to help identify a site that could be prepared for operation by the end of 2026.

Homelessness continues to pose a serious public health emergency. In Chittenden County, the unhoused population reached 834 individuals in January 2026, according to the latest Point-in-Time count, a census which estimates the number of sheltered and unsheltered people experiencing homelessness on a single night.

"CVOEO is ready to open and operate a new 100-bed shelter that will better meet the needs of our community," CVOEO executive director Paul Dragon said. "This is the right thing to do, and it is essential if we want to make meaningful progress in reducing street homelessness. A shelter of this scale would represent a significant step forward in CVOEO's continuum of care, expanding access to safe shelter while creating more opportunities for people to move from homelessness to stable housing. Most importantly, it would ensure that our most vulnerable community members have the support and services they need to begin rebuilding their lives."

CVOEO currently operates eight emergency shelters throughout Franklin and Chittenden Counties, including Burlington’s Emergency Cold Weather Shelter at the Robert Miller Community & Recreation Center. The organization assumed operations of the Miller Center Emergency Cold Weather Shelter from the city in December 2025 and opens the site when temperatures drop to -10 degrees for a sustained period of at least four hours. In addition to emergency shelter services, CVOEO provides housing navigation services, benefits navigation and supportive wraparound services to help people find housing, remain housed, and prevent homelessness.

"A new, year-round 100-bed shelter is both achievable and essential to meeting the growing needs of our community, particularly as we prepare for the winter months," Sarah Russell, CVOEO's emergency services director, said "We support the state's updated emergency cold weather shelter guidelines, which would require us to open the Miller Center when temperatures reach 10 degrees. However, CVOEO does not have the staffing capacity to operate a shelter at this higher threshold temperature, and the Miller Center serves a variety of other community functions, making it challenging to convert the facility into a shelter each time temperatures reach 10 degrees or below. A disaster response is not a sustainable solution. Investing in a dedicated, year-round shelter would provide a more effective, proactive, and compassionate response to homelessness while easing the operational challenges we face. Most importantly, it would ensure that our community is better equipped to provide safe, reliable shelter for those who need it most."

CVOEO and CHT have previously identified four sites as potential locations for the 100-bed shelter, but due to various circumstances, none of the sites were able to accommodate the shelter. CVOEO’s leadership welcomes any leads on a potential location for the shelter. CVOEO is working to secure funding for both the site and the operation. Credible leads can be shared with CVOEO’s Executive Director, Paul Dragon, by email at pdragon@cvoeo.org.