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A story about Vermont’s only permanent, supervised housing for people with serious mental illness.
Featuring:
- Anne Donohue, state representative from Northfield and Berlin, editor of Counterpoint
- Graham Parker, MyPad director
- Connie Stabler, mother and Howard Center board member
This show is part of a seven-part series I produced for Vermont Public Radio called They Are Us, which features personal stories from inside the state’s mental healthcare system.
Comments: Please make a comment or share a story if you’ve got one. Comments and conversation are part of the point!
Credits:
Series Advisor: Dillon Burns, mental health services director at Vermont Care Partners
Series Associate Producers: Clare Dolan, Mark Davis
Series Executive Director: Sarah Ashworth
VPR Advisors: Franny Bastian and John Dillon
Mixing: Chris Albertine
Digital Producer: Meg Malone
Series Logo: Aaron Shrewsbury
Music for this series is by two excellent Montreal-based bands:
Godspeed You! Black Emporer and Esmerine. Special thanks to the awesome Bruce Cawdron
For more information about the series, visit VPR. You’ll find the series schedule and resources.
Very big thanks to the following people for their knowledge, time and advice: M.T. Anderson, Melissa Bailey, Gretchen Brown, Seleem Choudhury, Anne Clement, Jimmy Dennison, Isabelle Desjardins, Laurie Emerson, Deb Fleischman, Laura Flint, Al Gobeille, Alix Goldschmidt, Gary Gordon, Keith Grier, Heather Houle, Jenniflower, Karen Kurrle, Lt. Maurice Lamothe, Sabrina Leal, Fran Levine, Martie Majoros, Jack McCullough, Mark McGee, Megan McKeever, Betsy Morse, Bess O’Brien, Roxanne Pearson, Julie Potter and her beautiful daughter, Malaika Puffer, Michael Rousse, Marla Simpson, Montpelier Senior Activity Center, Sandy Steingard, Tony Stevens, Cindy Tabor, Gloria Vandenberg, Konstantin von Krusenstiern.
Hi Erica, thanks again for your incredible stories. The below is such an incredibly sad tale, and one happening so often as a side story to gentrification of the inner city in Australia over the last 20 years of our affluenza. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-21/gatwick-st-kilda-alarming-number-women-in-prison/10513530?fbclid=IwAR3WVq44SBJRG-KomrH_yuGhmX0ZWpSnhOKbn7Fd_39CDc7s5QBXZ2ee5_I
Stan
That is unbelievably sad. Yeah. Prison seems to be the ‘solution’ to a lot of society’s problems these days. It’s a homeless shelter, a rehab, a mental hospital…
LOVE this show! Seriously, each episode has this beautifully nourishing quality which I’m not quite sure how you pull off. In 2012 I was sentenced to 60 months in prison which was the result of a seven year long addiction to heroin. Shortly after getting out I was diagnosed with ptsd, depression and anxiety (shocker, right?:). Episode 1: Sarah from your new This is Us series was like listening to someone telling my story. I immediately sent it to my brothers and parents so they might better understand me! So yeah, thank you so much for creating this show!
One last thing, I’ve spent in total about a year in a few different county jails. Sadly, the vast majority of inmates are very poor and severely mentally ill unable to afford bail and receiving little if any treatment/care. They are us. Resilient, creative, insightful, curious, broken, valuable human beings deeply longing For their story to be heard and understood.
Thanks again!
-Skyler