Just Getting By

Just Getting By—a new documentary film be Bess O’Brien is a sweeping, and yet intimate look at the lives of Vermonters who are struggling with food and housing insecurity.

Vermont has the second highest rate of homeless people in the United States, right after California. One third of Vermonters struggle to put food on the table. These are big issues for a small state. Just Getting By focuses on these issues in the lives of everyday people.

The film tells the stories of working families, folks who are homeless and are accessing food shelves and soup kitchens, people who are living in the temporary hotel/motel program, New Americans grappling with the cost of living in America, Native people creating innovative farming practices and folks on the ground providing services to their fellow Vermonters in need.

ust Getting By explores the day to day challenges and incredible resiliency that low-income Vermonters bear witness to every day.