 Welcome to Montpelier Civic Forum. And we have another session tonight. This one is a city council session. And we have an open seat. It's in District 1. It's Rosie Kruger's seat. And we've had eight persons, only one person step forward for this seat. And that's Lauren Hurl, who's sitting next to me. Lauren, welcome to Montpelier City Forum. Yeah, thanks for having me. Sure. Can you do me a favor? Tell me where in this district Lauren Hurl lives. Yeah, I'm up on Deerfield Drive off of Terrace Street. So great neighborhood. And I've got my little four-year-old goes to preschool at Turtle Island on Elm Street, another part of the district. So spent a lot of time making the rounds of it. And you're near Hubbard Park. Yes, yeah. The West entrance to Hubbard Park. Yes, so I love to spend time there. This is a gig on city council. It pays 1,000, 1,500 or something on that level. It pays very little. You also sit on committees besides sitting on council. And you sit through meetings that many of us, or at least I, find incredibly boring. Why would your family want you on city council? Yeah. I mean, to me, in part, I was inspired to run looking at what's happening in our country. And to me, I see all these threats to civil rights, environmental protections, and just a whole host of values that I hold dear personally. And I know that cities and state governments can really show a different path, and be inclusive, and welcoming, and support sustainability, and other things that I really value. So I see an opportunity to see what the city of Montpelier, I think, really embodies a lot of those values already in its city government. And so I'm excited to try to work with the city and keep fostering those kinds of values through our city government. How long have you been in Montpelier? I've been here about seven years. So moved up here. My older son is seven, turning eight soon, and had been living in DC, working on federal policy, and wanted to come to Vermont where my husband's from. And yeah, so settled here around then. Is Montpelier a city or a town? I always ask that. That is not something that I'm springing on you. It's something that you people who followed this for a while know that this is a regular question, because if you look at it as a city, it's one way. If you look at it as a town, it's another. What is Montpelier to you? I think it's characteristics of both. I mean, my most recent before living here was Washington, DC, and San Diego. And those were a lot bigger population-wise, and felt like cities in that regard. But I mean, I think, to me, Montpelier has a density and the hub of state government and other things. So it has, I think, a lot of the resources and things that a city has. So I think, you know, city makes- But it's still in some ways a town. But yeah, it has the benefits of city resources, but a town feel where you know a lot of people and it's a great community and connections. What is District 1? Where does District 1 follow? If I were looking at a map, that would be District 1. Yeah, so if you're looking at a map, it's a kind of funky shape. It goes up Elm Street and around the meadows. All the way to where Rosie Krueger lives. Yeah, all the way out there and the meadows. And then it goes up Terrace Street in the neighborhoods up there, where I live, and then out on State Street, headed towards the Dairy Cream, so. What makes District 1 different than District 2 over by Main Street Middle School and over by Union Elementary and District 3 that goes downtown and across the river? What kinds of unique situations do those people in District 1 face? Or what are their concerns? I mean, you must have walked a few houses to talk to your neighbors. Yeah, I mean, the top thing I'm hearing right now is infrastructure. And I mean, we had, even in my little neighborhood, we had a water main break and little circle right near us. And so, I mean, that, just the access to clean, safe water and what kind of, what's going on with the water main breaks has been the top thing that everyone I've talked to has brought up. So definitely something, excited to dig into, what is the plan? What is our, what are our long-term plans? Well, Council has started to address that at their last meeting. At least they had Tom McCartle from City Services talking about that. What's your thought on what's underneath those streets? Yeah. Do you feel good about that? Do you feel that in the long-term, that might be a problem or? Yeah, I mean, I think it's something, you obviously need to continually be investing in infrastructure. And I, in my day job, I work a lot on climate change. So to me, I think really revisiting again as we need to continue doing, what is the plan for the investment and knowing that we're gonna be having more and more weather extremes and so the kinds of cold and warming up events and that kind of thing and big precipitation events. How are we planning for it? Is our plan building to the future that we know is coming? And so those are questions I'm really excited to look into and learn more about and figure out are we strategically investing now so that we can save money over the long-term? How would that be done? Can you talk a little bit about strategically investing now for the long-term? Yeah, to me, I think it's again thinking about are we putting infrastructure in that we're gonna have to replace sooner if we're not building it to withstand the flooding and stuff that we know is likely to increase with climate change. So what might have been a hundred year flood in the past are becoming more and more frequent? So are you instead of having emergency responses or damaged infrastructure, what based on our best predictions are we building to the kinds of standards and making investments? So I don't know how much the emergency responses are costing but that cost versus just building out the infrastructure on a regular schedule so that we're maintaining it. And all accounts I've heard is that the city does a really good job and has a great program and so it's really just looking at that and making sure how forward-looking is it and incorporating that resistance. Well, we made a major investment last year in wastewater. Yeah. And in that investment is embedded the possibility of actually generating power from that and actually paying back to some degree. And I believe, actually I don't believe, and Watson has a show on this, it's really good on the city budget that you can watch and this is where I got it from. Anne was saying that right now it will generate enough to keep those facilities out there warmed. Yeah, it's great. Which is good. Yeah. So is that the kind of forward investment that you're thinking about in sustainability? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think, you know, whatever, being able to learn lessons from creative projects that people are doing in other cities and towns and across the world, I think there's a lot of really innovative thinking right now of how are, especially around power generation and other things so that we're getting off of fossil fuels and also, you know, being much more efficient and so being able to look at, you know, what kind of, how are we building to be as efficient as possible, as long lasting and resilient to the world, to our changing world. Now, Anne had spoken on that show that I'm referencing, you really ought to watch. It's an excellent show. She was speaking of trying to extend district heat to new customers. Yep. Do you believe in the district heat project? The wood chip burning? Yeah, I mean, I think it's great. I, you know, I spend my day job again working on climate change and other issues and I think trying to get off fossil fuels is great. You know, as Vermonters, we don't, you know, extract fossil fuels. We don't employ people in the fossil fuel industry so, you know, even putting aside the climate damage, we don't benefit from fossil fuels. Every, it's like, you know, 80 cents out of every dollar we spend on fossil fuels goes right out of state. So if we could keep more energy using local products like wood, wood chips, I think that's just a great kind of project that we should be looking at as, you know, these high efficiency, so I'm very supportive. No, this is not on the table, but word on the table are windmills on our horizon, you know. Would you agree with that? Above town? Above town? Over by Murray Hill in that area. Would you agree with windmills locally? Just assume that we're on the table. I mean, potentially, I mean, I'm open-minded about, you know, I mean, I'm an environmentalist and so I think, you know, you always have to look at what are the environmental costs and benefits and you know, is that sensitive wildlife habitat in wetlands or is that, you know, a location that's good for wind? I mean, I think wind has to be part of our energy future. There's no way to meet our climate, our state's clean energy goals without wind. So finding the right places for it. I think we do have to do. And to me, you know, saying that we're gonna just continue importing energy from elsewhere that's damaging another community is not really a fair and equitable approach to energy. So if I had to look at wind turbines but we were able to sustainably produce our own energy, I think that could be great if it was a good site for it. The Winooski, should we have a concern, you know, about ice floes and like it? Should there be future planning in your mind on the Winooski? Because we just saw what a water main will do when it breaks on Nelson and comes down to Main Street and the Winooski's a heck of a lot closer. Should we be concerned about the Winooski given climate, that back and forth whiplash of weather? Yeah, I mean, I think we absolutely should be looking at, you know, what are our plans? How are we dealing with anticipated changes and ice floes and, you know, what kind of, if we're putting new development in, are we ensuring that it's, you know, gonna withstand flooding that could be anticipated? So, you know, I think it's something we, everyone should be thinking about as we do look at development and making investments and, you know, how we're managing the river to keep everyone safe and people's property safe. In terms of managing the river, the Confluence Park, any feelings on that? Yeah, I mean, I love Greens Bay. That's right next to the river. Yeah, I mean, I've seen some of the schematics of it. I mean, to me, that would be a great, great thing to have, you know, even having two young kids having nice places like that to gather in our downtown, I think would be great. So, I'm supportive of that. You know, I know that there's lots of different proposals for using these little chunks of land. So, you know, I'm not sure about what all of the options are, but to me, using at least some of it for a park seems like a great kind of gathering and positive space for the community. Mophilia has always struggled with the push me, pull me of housing. Yeah. In terms of not being enough housing, in terms of housing, the rental housing being extremely expensive. Yeah. What's your thought on what council can do to help in terms of housing? Yeah, I mean, I think we need to be looking at, you know, do we have, I know that the zoning has been is being looked at right now. And so, you know, do we have policies that are supportive of dense housing? Or do we have- We've just gone through the zillion-year master plan. Yep. Where everybody sat in that process. And I suppose it's for the best that nobody really walked out of their half. A good compromise. Yeah, it was compromise. And I think that's what you really want is that, you know, it didn't spawn too many lawsuits. Right. And people walked out of their feelings somewhat better. But again, what does that do for housing in town? Yeah, I mean, I think we need to be making sure that any policy that we're putting in place and that we're looking at the kind of investments the city can make to ensure that we can develop. I think affordable housing and all kinds of housing really in Montpelier are essential. And even thinking about things like, you know, how are we supporting our net zero goals? I think affordable housing is a crucial part of that because the more that we can have people living in downtown that can walk places, that can have different ways of getting around, that can bike and do other things, you know, I think Montpelier is exactly the kind of place we should be putting housing and having a robust development in Montpelier. So I think the city needs to be looking at what more can we be doing? Whenever anyone mentions net zero. Yeah. I always ask, what is net zero? What is sustainable Montpelier to you? Yeah, I mean to me it is trying to achieve a community where we are producing the energy that we're using or able to use renewable energy for what we need. A big part of that is reducing the amount of energy that we're using as a community, which again, you know, the more that we're getting out of our cars and have other transit opportunities to get around, you know, in Vermont, heating our homes and getting around are the two ways, the biggest ways we use energy. And so if we can do things like supporting, weatherizing more of Vermont's homes, then they're saving money and more comfortable. What can we as a city do? I know what we as a federal government can do. I know what we as a state can do, but what can we as a city do within our current tax structure? Now I'll sit and play devil's advocate, realizing that our taxes, school and city are amongst the highest in the state. Yeah. And higher taxes, generally when you're trying, as you guys are, an eight year old and what, a four year old? Yeah, four and seven, yeah. Four and seven. Young families and higher taxes mean fewer young families, mean schools that are less populated and just put more pressure on the school district. How do we keep Montpelier affordable at the same time as we try and encourage weatherization and the like? Yeah, I mean to me, weatherization, that's something that, you know, there's an upfront investment and then you save money over the long term. So I think the beauty of it is if we can spur the investment, if there's ways that you can try to give people low or no interest loans or other things because we know the payback is there, then I think that's what the city could be looking at. What more are we doing? I know the state right now is having a lot of conversations about increasing funding. So maybe some of it even is education programs. People know that the resources are there and supporting that kind of thing because I think it is an affordability thing to not be heating the outside and keep more of your money, spend less on whatever fuel you're using to heat your home. So I think supporting programs like that are actually good affordability programs. Could you just briefly discuss the city's charter issue on energy and energy standards? Yeah, and I have- That's up for votes on town meeting day. Yes, and I have a lot to learn about it, but you know, so there's been a discussion for, I've been kind of part of this discussion at the state house and some of my work of, you know, how do we let people know how much it costs to heat a home and how are we putting energy efficiency requirements and labeling, and you know, when I bought my home, I had no idea what it was gonna cost to heat it and how much I was gonna pay. And so, you know, as you're doing your calculation as a potential home buyer and you know, they showed me a nice tour of how weatherized it was, but then we started getting our first heating oil bills and it was like, wow, this is really expensive to heat our house. And so, I think it would have been really helpful and informative to say, like build into your home budget that it's gonna cost this much. And by the way, you know, here are things you can do to save money by making investments now that you're gonna cut down that use. So I think it's a great kind of concept and they've struggled with it at the state level. I think being able to model it in the city and show that it actually is benefiting consumers and people, home buyers and renters to try to get a better grasp on what are we spending on this and what kind of programs. Once you're aware, you know, how, what programs are out there to help people do it. So you would require an energy audit to be done by the owner before selling? Potentially. Yeah, this is where I need to learn more about what exactly is being required. But I think there are, I mean, that is one thing that I know in the state policy has been talked about is that that would be part of the sale process is that you have. Again, if I could reference that excellent sale that Anne did. Yes, I need to watch that. She would need to watch. Very good show. Yes, I look forward to it. Anne talks about that. She said that what this charter change would do is to allow the discussion to be opened. And then once the discussion is opened, then the public can talk about what kinds of ordinances are desirable or not desirable. But this allows the conversation to come open to the floor. Yeah, so that's the kind of discussion I know has been happening at the state level. So I think caring a lot of perspectives on what could we be doing and what makes sense. And obviously always wanting to be very aware of if you're putting new requirements on, who is that cost falling onto and being very mindful of like those who can least afford to pay those costs. What are we doing to ensure that we're not putting burdens on people that can't afford it but are doing a program that could actually save people a lot of money over the long term and help make life more affordable? Realizing that renters aren't there for the long term. Right, but even if apartment building gets weatherized, then eventually rents should be able to come down if you're spending less money, you know. In theory. In theory, putting heat through the walls. Downtown, Montpeliers downtown. Yeah. At the end of the day is a very charming downtown with all kinds of, it's a downtown, let me rephrase that. It's a downtown that redevelopment really didn't happen. That in the 70s, while other towns had their old buildings ripped down, we only had a beautiful building that now is an ugly post office. But other than that, we pretty much ended up in tact. We've got a bunch of downtown businesses and they're struggling in the same way that small towns are struggling everywhere. How do we help our downtown to survive as a small downtown amongst many small downtowns? Montpeliers not in any way, shape or form, extraordinary either way. It's not extraordinarily turning itself out for people. It's not something that's fading because of anything that the business people are doing. It's caught in a macro issue of downtowns no matter whether in the suburbs, no matter whether in the big cities, no matter whether they're in small towns. What do you think Council can do to help our downtown? Yeah, it's a great question. I mean, I think one of the things I've been thinking about are are there things the city can do when you think about a company like Amazon that's out there and is such a hard competitor for so many of our downtown businesses? Are there ways that we can look at what the city is purchasing and work with other cities across the state, across a broader region perhaps? I know a lot of coalitions have formed among mayors and others around things like climate action. Can those kinds of coalitions be leveraged to look at? Can we use our purchasing power together to be supporting local businesses and within our own communities? So I think trying to get creative of what ways can we make sure that the activities we're doing, the investments that the city is making, are we really supporting those local businesses? So I'm sure there's a lot more to think about, but definitely it is your own to be. Invented in the city budget is $100,000 for our economic development, Montpelier Economic Development Corporation. And I think there's an additional 10,000 from Montpelier Alive. Those organizations, what do you think about them? I think it's great. I met with the executive director and I mean it sounds like having... Executive director, what's your name? Of the Montpelier Development Corporation, Laura. Yeah, and I think it sounded like her role of being able to both help businesses navigate the permit process and all of that and be kind of maintaining the vision for how we're making sure that development is the way we want it to be happening in the city and assuming that it is, that we're helping facilitate that. It seems like a smart investment to have somebody laser focused on that and trying to advance our goals as a city. We've also embedded in the budget somewhere our funds for the regionalization of our police, not our police, but our dispatch and trying to get a multi-approach to that. And then we haven't been able to bring that home and it's been going on for a few years. What do we do with that? Do we finally say, hey, this isn't working or do you think we ought to keep pushing at it? Yeah, I mean, definitely an issue I need to learn a lot more about like all of these. So probably in a year I go back and watch this and say, oh my, so much to learn. But you know, from what I have learned from talking to Donna Bate and some others about this issue, I mean, it sounds like there already is kind of regional responses that happen anyway. And so I think even if it feels like we're begging our head against a wall, like we need to keep having those conversations and see what kind of regional approaches could make sense given that doing everything in isolation, the big investments that sounds like we need a new fire truck soon and that's a million dollar investment and things like that. How are we working collaboratively with others and it sounds like some new relationships and other things have formed. So maybe it's slow, but maybe progress is being made. So I think we should keep exploring it. When we speak about Donna, Donna sits on the Transportation Committee and she's in that transportation planning mode. Last election, Connor Casey sat next to me and I asked him a question. I asked everyone and I'll ask you. In fact, I asked Donna, if there's an organization that's a quasi-governmental organization, Council has a representative on it. And I asked Connor, where do you see yourself as most productive? And Connor said, I would like to be the Council representative on Montpelier Alive. Connor is now the Council representative on Montpelier Alive. Which quasi-governmental body would you see yourself sitting on? Yeah, I mean, there's a few. I do think that- There's a library, there's not going to be a lot of this. There's so many. I mean, I definitely, I think my background working on a lot of issues with environmental issues and the intersection with transportation and so on, I'm very interested in that as well. So I probably would try to find somewhere that I could put those kind of expertise that I actually have to work. So something in the planning. And I mean, there's so many options. But yeah, I'll have to see where the need is too. The recreation department. Yeah. Any thoughts on the recreation center over on Berry Street? The plans that have been in the making on a much more elaborate facility? Yeah. Any thoughts on that? Because you're going to be presented to the Council that you are going to sit on. Yeah, yeah. Unless, of course, there's a massive writing campaign. Maybe. You don't know about it. You never know, you know, democracy. Keep it vibrant. But any thoughts on that? Yeah, I mean, we use the rec center now for my kiddos, basketball and stuff. So I was excited to see that the conversation around upgrading that was happening. I think it seems definitely like time. I know that as a parent of small children, I was in the camp of those who were like, an indoor pool would be such a great thing for the community. I don't know if the city necessarily needs to be the one to be building, maintaining, operating that. I think looking if there are opportunities to partner with First and Fitness or some other entity, perhaps trying to get creative around that, it seemed like there were definitely a set of people based on the responses that would be interested in that. I don't know that it looked like the potential cost per person was pretty high. So I think looking at what kind of partnering opportunities there might be would be one way to explore that avenue. And I do love having the rec center right walkable downtown is such a nice location. So being able to keep that makes a lot of sense to me. But lots more to learn and dig into on that one. Now, of course, there's an elephant in this room. I always say that. Every week there's some elephant. There's some elephant sitting in the room in every one of these shows. And this one is a parking garage. And the question is the legal morass that the parking garage finds itself in, how do we find our way out? I know that this is, I think part of it might be Act 250, I'm not sure. But I know that Act 250 stuff goes on and on and then on and on. How do we find ourselves our way out of this so that the help doesn't back out? But at the same time, you don't leave a set of people feeling that they've been ignored, marginalized, and that their concerns over the environment are not legitimate. What do we do? Yeah, I mean, I hope- The consul is in the middle of that one as well as the mayor. Yeah, I mean, I think that, and hope that there are a lot of robust conversations happening with the people who have filed the petition and the other, and really kind of working through what are the concerns, what can be addressed, what might not be able to be, but what's the explanation and what's the rationale for why? I mean, to me, we had a democratic process and the city voted a certain way, so I would hope people could come together and try to make it the best possible project. I think there's opportunities of, can we get solar on it? Can we make it a big EV charging station? Can we ensure- What is EV charging station? Caught me in using some jargon, an electric vehicle charging station. So, I hope that there can be a lot of work done together, compromises and really working through what are the core of the issues that people are concerned about so that can get to the other side of it. City council, after the election, in the beginning of the term, city council will meet in a retreat and we'll set out next year's goals. And I always ask this question as well because it's a legitimate one. You're going to be sitting in that room. There's reasons that you're running. Do you have an advocacy that you would like to see in that list of goals that city council will have that is your own? That's something that you would like to see as policy at least attention towards? Yeah, I mean, my top priorities right now are, and I don't know that I would say that they're my own so I think they're things that have been worked on already by city council and will probably continue but things that I would be particularly interested in prioritizing are, again, the kind of resilient infrastructure, the net zero and really what is the plan? We've got a great vision. How do we really get there? And making tangible progress towards that. I'm interested in the whole, for the rec center as a parent with young children and I think I'm the only person who would be serving on council with that perspective. I know some of them have older children but being able to bring that perspective of what policies are we doing and how does it impact children, families who might consider moving here, who are living here and also I think equity, inclusion, racial justice. What are we doing to be a welcoming, inviting city and how are we actually helping address income inequality instead of perhaps doing things that might be exacerbating it even unintentionally? What would those things be? I'm just curious, how can we as a city be exacerbating it except super high rent? Well, I mean, that's where I think even you can be working on a well-intentioned policy that if it's a flat fee for everyone that lower income people get disproportionately, that's a bigger hit on them than it is. So can you scale things progressively so that maybe there's a carve out for certain income levels or depending on your property value you pay different amounts. And so I think there's ways of just looking through the lens of are we with something, like if you, for example, a weatherization program at the state we've talked about, you could not pass along any, you couldn't do a rent increase related to that. So can you build into that because there's gonna be the cost savings over time so saying we're gonna make you pay upfront for our upfront expense and then we'll reap all the benefit later is not fair. So those kinds of things just being really careful that you're not inadvertently gonna bump up rent for people or that when you can craft a policy in a more nuanced way that can address those upfront. As we approach legalization of marijuana and sale of marijuana in town, is there any concerns that you have on that particular issue when we do have stores that will be selling marijuana in 2019, 2020, certainly, but possibly 2019? Do you, again, that's a state policy. State policy, yeah, yeah. It's not a local one, but how do you see that playing into any kind of existing drug problems if we have existing drug problems in this town? Do you think we have existing drug problems in this town? I think every town has some existing drug problems. You know, I think that's one that I would really try to, you know, this is a policy, you know, sometimes Vermont's out front pushing things. This is one that we're, you know, we have a number of states to look at and learn from. So I think looking at, you know, even similar-sized cities and towns and what, you know, in Colorado and Washington and, you know, what have they dealt with and are there things that we can try to proactively put in place? So that's kind of where I would start on that one is, you know, what kind of lessons can we learn from neighbors that have already dealt with this and gone through it first and... As a town rather than as a state? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, both from the city perspective and I know that, you know, a lot of those conversations are happening at the state house but I think for the actual, you know, what does that look like in Montpelier? You know, what can we learn and try to get out ahead of? Now your family is ready to have you gone for long stretches on Wednesday night, right? Yep, they are, they are. Luckily, very supportive family. At this point, yes. At this point, yes. Ask me again in a few months. Well, I want to thank you for coming down because you didn't have to, you're running unopposed and that's in district one so I would urge you to vote for her. Very qualified, as well as very affable and I want to thank you for watching this but before I let you go, get out there and vote on town meeting day. That's really important. I realize that there are no challenged races in this town this time but get out there anyway because voting is a good habit to make and make sure your friends vote and watch the other shows, particularly the one with Anne Watson. I'm pushing that one this year. Thank you so very much for watching. Thank you. Thanks. What'd you think? It's fun. See?