Parents and children prepared signed tee-shirts for the departing staff. Credit: Matthew Thorsen
The Janet S. Munt Family Room will be separating from its parent organization, the Visiting Nurse Association of Chittenden and Grand Isle Counties. The Family Room, a Burlington parent-child center that operates at St. Joseph School in the Old North End, has been part of the VNA since 1988.

“The VNA Board recognizes a need to concentrate our resources on services and programs most closely aligned with the agency’s home health and hospice mission, expertise and capacity — meeting the community needs we are most suited to address,” the VNA announced in a statement on Thursday.

The VNA will be involved in a “community-wide process to transition the Family Room” to a different organization, or to operate as a stand-alone entity, it added. That will take at least a year.

The announcement came less than six months after the VNA’s application for a grant worth close to half a million dollars was turned down. As a result, programming and jobs at the Family Room were cut last November, a decision that left many parents feeling blindsided and upset.

The Family Room Family website showed that parents have raised more than $52,000 through gifts and pledges as of February 17 to try to reinstate the positions and programming. Upcoming fundraisers include a benefit concert at ArtsRiot on March 3 and a community dinner at Bluebird Barbecue on March 16. They hope to raise $100,000 by the end of this month.

The VNA Family Room parent and community advisory council is “enthusiastic about the opportunity to take more leadership,” according to a statement the group released after the VNA announcement.

Related Stories

Got something to say?

Send a letter to the editor and we'll publish your feedback in print!

Kymelya Sari was a Seven Days staff writer 2015-19.

3 replies on “Family Room, Visiting Nurse Association to Part Ways”

  1. We need the support of the community NOW to make sure sufficient staffing is restored so a strong program is transitioned out of the VNA. The remaining staff is doing an AMAZING job of continuing to provide quality programming despite the cuts, but they are spread too thin, and some smaller things beyond the lost day of Family Play programming have also been affected. Running the center at the currently understaffed level for the duration of the transition is unacceptable.

  3. It is heart warming to know there are a lot of folks working hard to raise funds to support bringing some of the staffing back. There is a fundraising event on Friday, March 25th at Club Metronome. My Family Values Fundraiser with Jamie Lee Thurston and The Starline Rhythm Boys. http://www.ticketfly.com/event/1117279

Comments are closed.