• Rob Donnelly

This "backstory" is a part of a collection of articles that describes some of the obstacles that Seven Days reporters faced while pursuing Vermont news, events and people in 2022.

My wife and I were walking our dog in downtown Burlington in July when we passed a young man standing on a sidewalk, gesticulating oddly. He'd take a half step forward, move his hands in front of his face with no discernible purpose, step back, then repeat.

He seemed oblivious to the traffic whizzing past on North Winooski Avenue and the other people around. I paused and studied his strange ritual.

"Can I help you?" asked a woman seated on a nearby wall, indicating she knew the man.

I told her that I was a little concerned about the guy.

"Pshaw," she responded. "He's just drunk."

If I learned one thing as a student at the University of Rhode Island, it's what drunk looks like. This man was not drunk.

A guy I saw on Church Street a couple of nights later also seemed caught in a loop of shuffling steps, half turns and odd gestures, unaware of the summer-evening crowd.

Something is happening, I told a few reporters at Seven Days, where I'm the news editor. Maybe a bad batch of drugs had arrived? People were behaving oddly.

I could see that they weren't convinced. But from time to time throughout the summer, as I walked to work from my home in the Old North End to the Seven Days office on South Champlain Street or took the dog for an evening stroll, I'd spot another person behaving bizarrely.

Related Meth Use Is Growing Around Burlington — and Could Portend More Problems for Vermont

Meth Use Is Growing Around Burlington — and Could Portend More Problems for Vermont

By Colin Flanders

Health Care

One of them staggered into the intersection of Manhattan Drive and North Champlain Street as if he were half asleep. He swayed back and forth under a blinking red light, reached his arms up and crossed his forearms behind his head. He doubled over and scratched his head furiously, and his bare ass popped out of his shorts.

I texted a short video to a few colleagues.

"One more and we've got our trend piece," a reporter responded.

Just two days later, I got two more: I came across a man sitting on a front lawn a few blocks from my home, his head lolling around. Nearby, a woman lay facedown in dirt, literally squirming. After a few minutes, both stood, brushed themselves off, uttered something to one another and wandered off toward downtown.

I emailed health reporter Colin Flanders.

"Can you ask EMTs, cops and Turning Point whether they are dealing with some new drug, or a wave of potent meth or something?" I asked him. "I am not looking for this stuff, and yet I've seen people in this state four times the past week. Something is happening."

Flanders seemed determined to get to the bottom of it, which took some doing. A lack of data on meth in Vermont turned out to be part of the story. Weeks later, we published his definitively sourced piece, "Meth Use Is Growing Around Burlington — and Could Portend More Problems for Vermont."

Flanders' reporting showed that the drug had made inroads in the Burlington area. He interviewed a man who had formerly used meth and people who work in treatment programs. Meth was being detected routinely in drug screens; people picking up syringes at a needle-exchange program regularly discussed it.

Today's meth is manufactured in industrial-scale Mexican laboratories, and its chemistry is different than what was being cooked up in rank home labs back in the '90s. The drug can bring on paranoia and even psychosis. Little is known about how to treat users effectively, Flanders reported.

I can't say for sure that the people I saw were on meth, of course, but that seems the most likely explanation. And I'm happy to note that, as of this writing, I haven't seen anyone in this condition for several weeks. Of course, it's colder outside now.

What I do know for sure is that if you live in the Old North End, the best way to spot a story in Burlington is to commute on two feet, with your eyes wide open.