The Vermont House of Representatives did something kind of impressive a couple weeks ago. Not that the media paid much attention, due in part to all Trump all the time — and I let it pass by for that same reason, but I can play catchup when events call for it. So here I am, belatedly.

Way back on April 2, the House approved H.91, the “Vermont Homeless Emergency Assistance and Responsive Transition to Housing Program.” Quite a mouthful, but the acronym is VHEARTH, which is catchy indeed.

But that’s not the impressive part. What the bill’s writers managed to do is create a new state program from scratch. VHEARTH is meant to replace the much-lamented and chronically underfunded General Assistance Emergency Housing Program, d/b/a/ the motel voucher program. Yep, legislative leaders had been begging Gov. Phil Scott to propose an alternative to vouchers for years. Seems they finally got tired of waiting for the chief executive to do his damn job.

I first learned of this five days later, when the Barre Montpelier Times Argus published a front-page story (paywalled, sorry) about H.91 gaining House approval. I was so surprised to learn of a major Statehouse development in my sadly reduced local paper that I had to check and double-check to make sure I hadn’t missed a story in the more customary outlets like VTDigger, Seven Days, or Vermont Public.

But I hadn’t. Those usually dependable organizations either missed a major piece of legislation achieving a milestone, or they deemed it unworthy of their attention. If it was the latter, well, they were sorely mistaken.

C