Service Providers Tackle Problems at Burlington’s ‘Situation Table’

When Burlington’s urban park rangers encountered a family camping illegally in a public park, they brought the matter to a relatively new local resource: the situation table.

A small field team of service providers and public assistance coordinators from the state listened as the park rangers shared details about the family and the issues they faced. The team was able to convince the family to accept help from a broader group of social assistance nonprofits and health agencies. Within a week, the family was out of the tent and into stable housing.

Burlington and several other Vermont municipalities are among dozens of communities across the country that have adopted the situation table model. It allows city staff, state social services, health care providers and substance-use treatment programs to pool resources and quickly get help to people with complex problems.

In Burlington, representatives from more than 30 agencies and service providers come to the table weekly to hear about cases. Last winter, they learned of a man who was living on the streets, even though he had serious medical problems and relied on a wheelchair. The group was able to connect him with his family, who were able to intervene.

A couple camping in the city initially declined help but were eventually convinced to secure a housing voucher. An elderly Burlingtonian who was living alone despite serious physical and mental health issues was connected to home health services.

Progressive Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak and Democratic city councilors have been at odds over how to address homelessness, drug use and other ills plaguing the city. When defending her public safety record, the mayor has pointed to the situation table, as well as another program that takes aim at crime “hot spots” and a “support court” for people who are frequently arrested, as examples of her commitment to innovative and humane solutions.

These programs will ultimately succeed in pushing people to address the underlying social problems that lead them “to be unlawful and cause harm in our community,” Mulvaney-Stanak asserted during a press conference last month.

Burlington Democrats, responding to complaints from business owners and concerned residents, are growing increasingly impatient with the mayor’s current approach to public safety. In a wide-ranging resolution presented in July, they called for expanding police presence downtown and in known problem areas while encouraging a firmer hand from law enforcement around public drug use and unsanctioned camping.

The Queen City’s reputation has taken a battering in the national press, where Mulvaney-Stanak, Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George and their progressive politics are often blamed for the state of the city’s downtown. Just last week, Boston Globe columnist Kevin Cullen insinuated that declining enrollment at the University of Vermont was related to these issues and lamented the failure of center-left candidate Bram Kranichfeld to unseat George in August’s Democratic primary. That comes on the heels of an Atlantic article that included Burlington in a look at how a handful of liberal cities have been ravaged by the homelessness and opioid epidemics.

Last Friday, Mulvaney-Stanak faced Burlington business owners who had packed city hall to vent their frustrations about needle litter, defecation in public spaces, and other bad behavior involving homeless people in and around Church Street.

“As mayor of our city, I am not OK with the status quo of what’s going on in our downtown and community,” Mulvaney-Stanak told the crowd.

First introduced in North America 15 years ago, the situation table program has since spread around the U.S. The state began funding several using a federal grant in 2022 as part of Gov. Phil Scott’s 10-point public safety plan. They’re all supported by Cordata, a Cincinnati health care company that has helped St. Johnsbury, Rutland, Springfield, Barre, Bennington and other cities across the country stand up their own situation tables.

Ingrid Jonas, a former major in the Vermont State Police and community safety adviser in the mayor’s office, started the program in Burlington. She handed it off to Anna Wageling, who now heads up the city’s small, busy team of community support officers and liaisons. Embedded in the police department, these five social workers interact with the homeless population, provide support to domestic violence victims and assist officers with death notifications.

Wageling is the situation table’s primary coordinator. When people in need are receptive, she said, the initiative allows service providers to better communicate and deliver assistance.

For the situation table to get involved, the subjects have to waive confidentiality, allowing agencies to share information about them. Then resources from the fleet of support services can come into play.

After police, the fire department brings the most situations to the table.

“I can’t express how helpful having them in the city is. I really feel like they’re the glue at times,” Burlington Fire Department’s EMS battalion chief Marsha McCombie said of Wageling and her team.

The results have been somewhat promising. The group has tried to intervene in 102 cases since the program began in July 2025. Nearly 60 people involved were successfully connected to services.

But roughly one in four people weren’t, either because of systemic barriers, such as a lack of housing or medical care, or they refused assistance. Twelve participants lost contact after the process began, and one died.

Under Mulvaney-Stanak, the city has created other initiatives that, like the situation table, explore creative solutions to the city’s public safety issues. For example, a “hot spot” program that began in 2024 to address issues at Fletcher Free Library was restarted in July. Director Mary Danko said she wants to bring the lessons she’s learned from easing tensions at the library to public spaces such as parks and parking garages. Police and drug incidents at the library dropped significantly after a security guard and a Howard Center social worker were assigned to the facility.

“We’re really just trying to think of quick, innovative ways where hopefully we can just bring the temperature down,” she said in an interview. “And one of those ways is hopefully giving people some of the services and connections that they need.”

Initiatives such as these receive only a small amount of the city’s overall public safety investment. The library security guard costs $135,000 a year. A $25,000 federal grant paid for Cordata to provide training, and the state continues to pay for the program out of the opioid abatement settlement fund. But most of those involved in these programs are already city staffers and have simply added the extra work to their day-to-day jobs.

Interim Police Chief Shawn Burke said he admires how the situation table gets “the right solution on the right problems” but said it doesn’t make up for the department’s desperate need for more uniformed officers.

“There’s limits as to what we can use our community support liaisons for, and we are completely outnumbered on the sworn side, given the call demands,” he said.

The number of police employed in Burlington was at 92 in June 2020 but had declined to 55 as of late August. Only 44 of those officers are actually available for active duty, Burke said, and half of them are deployed downtown.

Mulvaney-Stanak’s current municipal budget includes funding for 10 more police officers. But according to Burke, the city’s “political landscape” has meant that, despite offering salaries above the industry standard and a $25,000 signing bonus for qualified officers, the department has attracted few new applicants.

“If I had the luxury of putting a uniformed cop in [City Hall] Park, we would see the behavior there change drastically,” Burke said.

Responding to growing pressure, the police department in August made 11 low-level drug arrests in the park with support from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

The arrests were about the optics of cleaning up the park, Burke acknowledged. Such cases were not the best use of the drug unit’s time, he said, which would be better served focusing on “mid- to upper-level traffickers.”

Burlington’s public safety officials have long asserted that a small number of people create a large number of problems in the city. Just 56 people were involved in 18 percent of all police-related incidents through the first half of 2026, according to department data. Of that number, 13 have been brought to the situation table.

Another 20 of those 56 people are involved in State’s Attorney George’s support court, which is meant to address repeat offenders facing low-level charges. The aim of the court is to quickly address the underlying causes of the participant’s recidivism. A handful of these repeat offenders are involved in both programs.

While the situation table has increased the speed and coordination of assistance, the program has its limitations.

Wageling has found that just connecting someone with a provider isn’t enough. She has helped people get into rehab programs only to see them back on the street after their insurance runs out. Those who are able to obtain a coveted housing voucher then have to follow the rules to keep it or end up back on the street.

“People are still struggling. Just because they know about services doesn’t mean that their risk really has lowered,” Wageling said.

With a city data analyst, Jeff Nicholson, Wageling has developed a system to track outcomes so she can recognize the barriers that people face. Over the small sample size analyzed so far, most have been unable to access housing and often can’t obtain medical care.

Wageling acknowledged that more needs to be done to solve the public safety problems. But she’s confident her program is making a difference. Wageling has met with people involved with other situation tables, including some outside Vermont. Burlington’s woes, she said, are common.

“We are all struggling with more barriers being put up, more resources depleted, people who are just really struggling,” she said. “And I think it’s important to remind ourselves of that, especially if we’re feeling like this is the only place that it’s happening. It’s not. It’s everywhere.” ➆

The original print version of this article was headlined “Seat at the ‘Situation Table’ | A new Burlington program brings together social service providers to help people address their problems”

This article appears in September 2 • 2026.

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