Barre, Vermont
The Setting
Washington County is a largely rural county of approximately 60,000 people in central Vermont, with its county seat in Barre. The pretrial program is operated by a court diversion agency funded by the Vermont Attorney General's Office, one of 14 such programs serving counties across the state. The agency employs five and a half staff across multiple programs, with one case manager dedicated to pretrial services. Referrals come from the court, and individuals may self-refer, typically through their defense attorneys. Last year, the pretrial program received 191 referrals, up from approximately 10 in its first year of operation in 2018. The program is low-barrier by design, and engagement is voluntary even when ordered by the court.
The Challenge
Washington County has seen a surge in homelessness following the end of COVID-era hotel voucher programs, the closure of a major regional mental health facility, and an 18-month-plus wait for public assistance housing. Demand for mental health and substance use services significantly outpaces what is available: the county's designated mental health agency carries a four-to-six-month waitlist, and inpatient substance use treatment is limited to only a few weeks, after which individuals are discharged with no sober living options. The result is a pretrial population facing acute, overlapping needs that have little to do with the legal charge itself and few places to turn.
The Strategy
The program's defining choice is a deliberate limitation on its own role informed by Vermont law, 13 V.S.A. § 7554c. Staff do not position themselves as therapists or long-term case managers. They are navigators: their job is to connect people to the right community resource and then step back, so that the relationship the person builds is with the provider, not with pretrial.
In practice, this navigation takes many forms. For mental health services, the case manager and client work through Psychology Today, a free online directory of therapists searchable by location, insurance type, and specialty, sitting together at a computer. Most clients are on Medicaid, and the program helps those who lack coverage navigate enrollment. The team has helped clients obtain birth certificates, apply for food stamps, and access general assistance. When the local provider has a multi-month waitlist, the team looks for alternatives rather than waiting.
For individuals who are unhoused, the office serves as an informal resource hub. It maintains a free clothing donation closet, provides snacks, and stocks hygiene supplies and overdose reversal supplies in the bathroom. Clients can charge their phones there. In a community without a drop-in center, this fills a visible gap. Staff also recognize that many people arriving at pretrial services have not had a genuine opportunity to be heard during the court process. Being willing to listen without judgment, before moving to the question of what services are needed, is part of how the program builds the trust that makes navigation possible.
“Community connection is the goal. We coordinate services to pass them on to a provider that will be there longer and will be the person they call if there's an emergency.”
— Pretrial program director, Washington County
What Made It Work
The navigator identity grew from the agency's organizational roots. All of Vermont's pretrial services are housed in agencies providing court diversion programs, and this restorative justice origin shapes how staff understand the work. Coming from a different lens than the Department of Corrections, staff start from the assumption that unmet basic needs typically drive criminal justice involvement, and that the response should be connection, not control.
Referrals come primarily through the court. At arraignment, the judge issues a pretrial services order; however, this is not a condition of release. Vermont law states that failure to comply with the order is not a violation. The program attends arraignments every Thursday morning, and staff walk out with individuals to hand them a business card and explain what pretrial services does. Public defenders play an important supporting role: because the program invested years in building that relationship by showing up consistently and demonstrating value, public defenders now introduce their clients to pretrial staff directly from the courtroom and actively explain what the program can offer.
Considerations for Replication
Defining the role clearly before the program launches is essential. A navigator model requires staff who understand what they are not, and who are genuinely comfortable with that boundary. Programs that drift into providing direct services lose the capacity to navigate broadly and risk creating dependency on the pretrial relationship rather than building community connections that outlast the case.
In communities where formal services have long waitlists or simply do not exist, informal resource hubs fill gaps that no referral can address. Stocking a bathroom with hygiene supplies, overdose reversal supplies, and emergency resources, keeping snacks available, and offering phone charging are not peripheral to the work. For an unhoused person navigating the court system, they are often the reason to come back.
In the summary brief
Build layered, low-cost solutions to the transportation, distance, and technology barriers that drive failures to appear.
The office itself serves as an access point: for individuals experiencing homelessness, the program maintains a clothing donation closet, stocks hygiene supplies, and offers phone charging, filling a visible gap in a county without a drop-in center.
Also under Strategy 8
This project was supported by Grant No. 15PBJA-22-GK-03661-JAGT awarded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance. The Bureau of Justice Assistance is a component of the Office of Justice Programs, which also includes the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the National Institute of Justice, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, the Office for Victims of Crime, and the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking. Points of view or opinions in this document are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.