House committee hears Burlington update on planned overdose prevention center; health department says existing grant suffices for now

Teresa Visena, testifying for the city of Burlington, told the House Human Services Committee on May 6 that the city is in a planning and capacity-building phase for an overdose prevention center (OPC) and has a 24-month grant that began July 1, 2025. "The city received a 24-month planning and capacity building grant that began July 1st, 2025," Visena said, and added that the contract uses a prospective-payment model that has complicated early expense tracking.

Why it matters: H660 includes a proposed $1.1 million addition intended to support an OPC in Burlington during an operations phase. Committee members asked whether reserving that money in H660 would meaningfully accelerate site identification or launch. Visena said the H660 funds are aimed at the operations phase (FY27) rather than fixing current planning-phase barriers and that significant upfitting and equipment costs will be incurred once a site is identified.

VCGR’s community partner and the city’s implementation team described program planning and the new service assessment. Tom Dalton, who identified himself as executive director of Vermont Chris for Criminal Justice Reform, and Jess Kirby, who said she is the OPC director and a person with lived experience, told members their organization was selected as the city’s community partner and has been providing outreach, surveys and implementation support. Dalton said VCGR works with more than 400 high-risk people and that many describe prior overdoses or injection use.

The presenters released a service-assessment report that was posted to the city website and which the panel was told will be converted into local-facing resources in partnership with Brown University. Visena emphasized that references in recent news coverage to “three locations” came from survey responses identifying areas with the highest community response rates and do not represent a city decision to pick specific sites. "Those three areas... received the highest percentage of responses in the community survey," she said, adding the process included more than 1,500 community-survey responses plus focus groups and one-on-one conversations.

On the question of why the facility is called a prevention center, Rep. Steady asked whether the site would be "putting drugs into people’s bodies." Jess Kirby replied, "the prevention is... preventing overdose deaths," clarified that "no drugs are provided at the facility," and said the center is intended to reduce fatal overdoses and connect people to treatment and services.

Service-assessment findings presented to the committee included data from a lived-experience survey sample and broader community polling. In the lived-experience sample cited by presenters, 47% had experienced an overdose in the past year and 80% reported being unhoused; among community respondents the presenters said there were over 1,500 completions. Presenters reported that high proportions of respondents — often above 90% in targeted samples — said they would consider using an OPC and that many would use it frequently if available.

Shayla Livingston, interim deputy commissioner at the health department, told the committee the department is monitoring the city’s planning work, conducting site visits (virtually for now), and uses prospective payments to manage grant cashflow. "We do not believe at this time that they need additional funding," Livingston said, adding that an operations grant would follow only once a site is identified and the city is ready to execute contracts.

What the committee asked and what remains unresolved: Members repeatedly questioned timing and whether holding $1.1 million in H660 would prevent that money from funding other needs if an OPC is not ready to operate in FY27; Visena said the city’s intention is to identify a site by the end of the calendar year so upfitting could occur in FY27, but she acknowledged uncertainty and pointed to examples of multi-year timelines in other jurisdictions.

Next steps: Committee members said they will review the full service-assessment report linked in the testimony and continue oversight; H660 was reported to be scheduled for a Senate vote the following day, and lawmakers will weigh whether to reserve the $1.1 million pending site identification and readiness.