Last week, the Budget Adjustment Act sailed through the House on more or less a party-line vote, with Republicans raising whiny objections over a penny-ante increase in funding for the General Assistance Emergency Housing program. Gov. Phil Scott did his share of whining as well, and there’s been some talk of a possible BAA veto. Which, if it happens, would be utterly ridiculous.

But amidst all the Republican whining, the most ignorant, shameful, bigoted remarks actually came from a Democrat. Stay tuned for more on that.

This all happened against the backdrop of a tremendous piece of journalism that dropped the day of Scott’s comments and the day before the House’s BAA debate: a story by Vermont Public‘s Liam Elder-Connors and Seven Days‘ Derek Brouwer exploring how many unhoused people have died in Vermont, a statistic the state has so far declined to keep. With that story on the front page, it was a bad time to bitch about an extra $1.8 million in motel vouchers.

The two reporters found that “at least 82 people in Vermont… died between 2021 and 2024 while appearing to reside in an emergency shelter or outdoors.” That’s almost certainly an undercount; no one in Vermont officialdom tracks that number, nor does anyone seem interested in doing so. Outgoing Health Commissioner Dr. Mark Levine said it would be “very challenging” to collect such data.

Not as challenging as, say, sleeping outside in the dead of winter, but sure, let’s only keep the easy statistics.

Leading off the Whine Parade was the governor. At his weekly presser on Wednesday, with the big story right there on the front page of Seven Days, Scott called the GA program “a failed policy.” Well, I guess it hasn’t solved our homelessness crisis. In that way it’s “a failed policy,” but it was never intended to do that. What it was supposed to do, and what it has succeeded in doing, is keeping roofs over the heads of a hell of a lot of people. It’s cut way down on deaths and suffering.

The Dems’ addition is also much cheaper than Scott’s Potemkin Village “family shelters,” which have cost at least $3 million and probably more while sheltering maybe three dozen or so people. That’s a small fraction of all those unsheltered since voucher cuts took effect in September. Besides, there are still homeless families, so by Scott’s metric it’s “a failed policy.”

Minority Republicans, perhaps chastened by the Vermont Public/Seven Days exposé, mostly stayed quiet before voting “No” on a BAA that made minute changes from what Scott had proposed. Only two Republicans, Reps. Gina Galfetti and Rob North, spoke in opposition, and both focused on process arguments rather than substance. They accused majority Democrats of slipping “policy alteration” into the BAA instead of confining themselves to, you know, budget adjustments. I haven’t done a deep study of BAAs past and present, but I daresay a lot of BAs also involve PAs. That’s “policy adjustments” to you.

North also horked up a bit of nonsense about “the opportunity to pay down debt” when Vermont doesn’t carry any debt aside from routine capital investments.

Galfetti slipped in what she thought was a real zinger about how the GA Housing expansion was “nefariously slid through” for which she reportedly apologized on Friday, although I find no reference to any apology in Friday’s House Journal.

But the booby prize goes to a Democrat, sorry to say. Freshman Rep. Will Greer, who also serves as secretary of the Vermont Democratic Party, somehow believed that this lamentable outburst of bigotry was worthy of inclusion in the official record:

“Madam Speaker: The State cannot continue to allocate the money, or resources, to the continuation of the program, authorized under Section 88 of H.141, that offers no systemic change and only enables the perpetrators of the drug and opioid crisis to destroy lives by using this program as a means of mass drug distribution, and centers of criminal activity, which jeopardizes the safety and well-being of children and families. Simultaneously, by amending this prior agreement, we continue to erode the principles of personal responsibility over one’s own choices. We cannot continue to help people that will not help themselves. In the interest of my constituents and for the other needed and valuable programs, I will support H.141.”

Christ on a cracker. That mess would make Bobby Starr blush. Greer just labeled motel voucher recipients as criminals and drug dealers and indeed, as “perpetrators of the drug and opioid crisis.” That’s just gross.

The weird thing is, the guy seems to be a fairly progressive fellow with a particular interest in justice reform. He was the subject of a fawning profile in The Advocate last fall when he was a candidate for the House. As a gay man, he ought to know better than to engage in hateful stereotyping of marginalized people.

I don’t know, he’s very young, maybe he just needs to grow up a little. But that kind of language, freely uttered in an official setting, should have earned him a stern talking-to from caucus leadership. His remarks are far more worthy of apology than Galfetti’s. The Vermont Democrats will hold a meeting on February 22 where they will be choosing a replacement for outgoing party chair David Glidden. They should maybe think about picking a new secretary while they’re at it. If Greer harbors this kind of animus toward Vermont’s most vulnerable, he shouldn’t be allowed to hold a prominent role in the party.

Enough of that. The BAA now heads to the state Senate, where many a House-backed improvement in the GA Housing program has previously gone to die. But the departure of former Senate Appropriations Committee chair Jane Kitchel may have changed that calculus. Kitchel was a loud and determined opponent of the program. Now that she’s out of the picture, and the House has proposed a truly affordable amendment to the program, one can hope the Senate will go along with it. At that point it’ll be up to the governor. Who will probably whine some more and let the BAA become law without his signature, because that’s the kind of leadership he offers.