Even as the first round of The Great Unhousing is literally just around the corner, Vermont Legal Aid has stepped in with a class-action lawsuit seeking to force an extension of the motel voucher program. And to judge from the complaint filed in Washington County Court, it may well win this thing because of the Scott administration’s sheer incompetence in operating the program.

VLA sued on behalf of five voucher clients plus “other similarly situated,” presumably meaning the 1,800 households due to lose their shelter at the end of this month, next month, or possibly late July. (The administration has announced a four-week extension for some of those scheduled to lose eligibility on July 1, but can’t even specify how many will qualify for an extension. Sloppy, no?)

A hearing is scheduled for Thursday, where VLA will seek an injunction blocking the state from evicting any voucher clients and force the state to follow due process from here on.

At first glance, I thought this was kind of a Hail Mary. After all, can’t a government decide to terminate a program? But the complaint (downloadable here) paints a picture of managerial ineptitude pervasive enough to provide a basis for court action. Assuming VLA’s complaint is accurate, and they don’t have the reputation of making stuff up for the hell of it.

And boy, wouldn’t it be ironic, don’tcha think, if Team Scott was forced to continue the program because it made a complete hash of the process?

Generally, VLA alleges that during the voucher program’s existence, the Scott admin “issued several ‘rule waivers’ and ‘policies'” that “were never adopted through rulemaking nor adequately communicated to program participants.”

Further, the complaint asserts that while the state has announced its intention to return the emergency housing program to its much more restrictive pre-pandemic rules, “Defendants did not properly reinstate the pre-pandemic rules or provide adequate notice” to program clients. It also cites the Scott administration’s failure to provide any clarity at all about that four-week July extension.

But wait, there’s more! The VLA says that the administration…

…failed to provide [plaintiffs] with individualized written notice of the basis for their terminations, and failed to deliver written notices in a manner that was reasonably calculated to reach individual participants. Defendants failed to take reasonable steps to ensure that program participants understood what program they were being housed under, how long they would be housed, and how that was determined.

Failed, failed, failed. See a pattern here?

The complaint goes on to specify exactly when and how the Scott administration failed to communicate with the five complainants, and how those failures have caused harm to the complainants. In many cases, plaintiffs have learned about changes in the program from motel staff, not from anyone in state government. The complaint cites a passage in Vermont law that allows the court to intervene when a “rule, or its threatened application, interferes with or impairs, or threatens to interfere with or impair, the legal rights or privileges of the plaintiff.”

I’m not a lawyer, so I can’t say how this will play out in a courtroom. But VLA describes one hell of a clusterfuck that, frankly, is of a piece with what we otherwise know about Team Scott’s, shall we say desultory, handling of the voucher program. Even if the judge allows the evictions to proceed, the Scott administration will leave the courtroom with copious amounts of egg on their faces. Which is the very least that they deserve.