-Ernest Martin prepared to leave the Hilltop Inn in Berlin on Sunday morning, uncertain about what could come next. The 58-year-old said a friend would let him stay at her home for "a week or two," but after that, "I have no clue."
Martin, who suffered a traumatic brain injury after a hit-and-run several years ago, had been living at the motel since February. That morning, he had called the state at 8 o'clock sharp, hoping to secure his room for just a little while longer. After about two hours on hold, the news was bad.
"She wasn't rude in any way," he said of the worker he spoke to from the Department for Children and Families. "She just said there's nothing they can do for me."
At motels and hotels across Vermont, the impacts of the state's latest attempt to scale back its emergency housing program began to come into stark focus on Sunday. Unlike prior mass evictions from the program, this one will come in waves over the course of the fall.