The state is rolling out another round of moving reimbursement grants for new Vermonters, four years after gaining national attention for launching its popular remote work program.

The $3 million program, which was approved by the legislature this spring, provides grants of up to $7,500 for people who have moved to Vermont to take a job or to work remotely for a position in another state.

But this could be the final round of the moving reimbursements because the program’s main proponent, Sen. Michael Sirotkin (D-Chittenden) is retiring from the legislature. The House only approved the measure last year as part of some larger compromises, said Rep. Mike Marcotte (R-Coventry), chair of the House Committee on Commerce and Economic Development. He’s not a fan.



“The House has never been keen on this program,” Marcotte said on Monday. “With the housing issues we have, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.”
Vermont made international news in 2018 when Gov. Phil Scott unveiled the program, which offered $10,000 to anyone who wanted to move to the state and work remotely. The incentive was created by Sirotkin’s committee, but the Scott administration — looking for ways to draw in much-needed working-age residents — supported it strongly after it drew thousands of applications from around the world.

State Auditor Doug Hoffer is not a fan. In 2019, he released a report arguing that there is no way to prove whether the program serves as an incentive — or as a handout to people who were planning to move to Vermont anyway.

The Agency of Commerce and Community Development, which administers the program, said the state has awarded $1.7 million in relocation grants since the start, to 435 workers.

The program has been modified over the years to include people who are taking local jobs, not just remote ones. But with the onset of the pandemic, Vermont’s available housing supply, always tight, dropped considerably, and now many employers list the state’s housing shortage as the No. 1 reason why they can’t find the staff they need. With a rental vacancy rate of under 1 percent in Chittenden County, critics say it’s time for the moving reimbursement to go.

“Given the housing crunch, I don’t understand why this is something that is a priority,” said Patti Komline, government relations manager for the law firm Downs Rachlin Martin. “You’re paying people to come here, but you have nowhere for them to live.”

Economic Development Commissioner Joan Goldstein acknowledged that some people worry that the program will worsen Vermont’s housing shortage. The state is working to make it easier for developers to build housing, Goldstein said, but meanwhile it also has to try to tackle the workforce shortage. Vermont’s population appears to have grown slightly as people moved to the state during the pandemic, but Goldstein said there’s no telling whether recent arrivals will stay.

“You can’t make a decision based on a short-term blip,” she said.

The program is not part of ACCD’s base budget; it operates on one-time funding. So to continue it beyond the current fiscal year, lawmakers would have to approve it once again. Vermont has seen very high turnover in the Statehouse this year after many lawmakers opted not to run for reelection.

“We have a very different legislature as we go into the January session,” Goldstein said. “No doubt some will like it, and some won’t.”