 All right. Good afternoon, everyone. Are you hearing me okay. Great. Okay, we will get started. Welcome. Thank you for joining us for this briefing about the south end innovation district. We have a number of partners that you will hear from today, who have played in a role in getting this critical ordinance change, zoning ordinance change to this point. And we also have Megan Tuttle, our city planner, who is here and members of the media have technical questions about what is before the city council tonight. Megan will give some remarks to that and we can of course answer questions. Let me just start with a few quick remarks to kick things off. This is very significant milestone we're reaching today is one that we've been working towards for a long time. From that perspective, we are in the teeth of a historic housing crisis and a historic crisis and homelessness, and to say that is almost redundant, although some people sometimes get confused on this or doubt this homelessness is a housing problem. And we are in the crisis we are today because of decades of problematic and really failed policies that have made it way too hard to build homes in Vermont in Burlington, Chinden County and really statewide. There is really no more obvious example of that policy failure than in the area that we're talking about today. Most of the south end innovation district today is just a little bit of a kind of juxtaposition in that the set the district does include some really exciting parts of the city includes the new hula development. And we are grateful to have Russ Scully here today, who has been the champion, the sponsor of that incredible development which has created some of the most progressive and innovative and exciting employers in the region in it. This is true of the innovation building, which has long been a source for a lot of jobs and progress, much of the less rest of the of the district is surface parking lot today in the right in the middle of the state's largest city. We have acres and acres that has been just relegated to being a surface parking lot for for many years. And one of the reasons a big part of the reason that it looks the way it does today is because it is currently illegal to build any new housing in the entire 84 acre, I believe, district. The action before the council tonight the council has it in their power to change that tonight. And this is, there is a public hearing tonight, after which the council could take action, and we hope will take action to implement this new ordinance. And the works since the end of 2021. And when it was one of the 10 points in the housing action plan that my office released at the end of 2021, and the potential for this change is great. There is already a partnership between the city group called ride your bike led by Russ Scully, Champlain College, and we are in talks with Champlain housing trust that could create approximately 700 new homes in the coming years. And this new innovation district in the wake of the passage of this zoning, the potential chains goes well beyond that in other parts of the district there's a lot of additional underutilized space that could resolve in hundreds of additional homes as well. So this is a very significant action it's one of the most significant steps that we can take today to solve future housing crises. And it is a, it is a moment that really marks, I think a dramatic change in the way the city thinks about housing. And I'm very grateful that we have partners here today that can speak to the way what you're now welcoming new housing and parts of the city that we haven't always in particular, we're going to be joined by Jack Tiano from this new group for monitor people oriented places which has been a big part of the grassroots call for more housing which is, again, the way that we are going to work our way out of the housing crisis we're in today. So with that. And again, I'll hand it over you to take the next step in this. Great. Thank you, mayor. Just to briefly reiterate what the mayor said in his introduction about why we're talking about the south end innovation district. One of the most notable things about this proposed zoning change is that we are talking about the potential to allow dense mixed use development in a large swath of the city that is currently dominated by underutilized parcels. And specifically looking at the potential to allow that mixed use development to include large amounts of housing, which has not been permitted in this part of the city in the past. The proposal that the council will be considering this evening includes the creation of an overlay zoning district to apply to just a portion of the south end enterprise enterprise light manufacturing district and the intent of this new zoning district is really to help facilitate a vision that has emerged from both our planning process for the south end dating all the way back to 2014 and specifically to implement a key initiative of that 10 point housing plan that the mayor mentioned. It's worth mentioning that in the 2014 planning process, the conversation about whether or not, and how housing could be part of the south end innovation district was discussed extensively. This is an idea, creating a mixed use district in this part of the city is an idea that has long been discussed. And while the south end plan did not specifically recommend housing in this location. It recognized the importance of housing as an element of a thriving south end innovation district and the business and arts community that exists there today and in the future. So that plan really teed us up and directed us to have more conversations about housing in the south end, particularly as the city's needs have changed, and the mayor's housing plan from 2021 really became the point in time for us to have those conversations in earnest. I think the next couple of slides just summarize and reiterate what the mayor had mentioned about what was included in the 10 point action plan. And this specific rezoning talking about the south end innovation district was one of the key initiatives that was included under the goal to double the rate of housing production. So as the mayor said the potential for hundreds of new homes within this area of our city. As we move forward, I'll just briefly highlight some of the details about what this amendment discusses. Again, this district is intended to guide the development of area and area of the city and parcels within that area that are largely undeveloped or underutilized today. As you can see here in the map on the right that the district spans roughly from Howard Street to Sears Lane, and includes a number of large parcels to the west of Pine Street covers just over 80 acres including 13 of those acres that are existing surface parking lots and a number of other portions of this district that include former former industrial or brownfield sites. We're trying to use the opportunity of this zoning district to help us build on the vibrancy of the south end as a as a neighborhood and as an important economic contributor in the community, and allow for mixed use development that will further enhance that the amendment itself includes land use standards that will allow for that range of residential and non residential uses. So that's everything from arts and makers office and innovation, other non residential uses that really support the idea of a neighborhood a new neighborhood in this area. Importantly, as the housing that is created in this district comes online, it will be required to meet the city's inclusionary zoning standards, which will require that a minimum of 15% of those units meet our affordability limits. The amendment itself also includes specific standards for building height that ranges anywhere from four up to eight stories and you can see in the map on the right where those height limits will apply throughout the district. The areas in blue are four stories which is the existing height limit in the enterprise zoning yellow would be up to six stories and the red is up to eight stories. The standards also include other specific provisions that help us manage the overall size and way that new buildings are created to help kind of form a new district that is livable walkable and achieves a high level of density. We are also including within this specific standards that help us make the best use of the land that's available in this district. As we said, a large portion of this district today is dedicated to surface parking, and the standards that we're developing will actually start to limit that surface parking in support of mixed use development that helps us bring more space for business and residential into this area of the city. On the next few slides we are asked a lot about just the proposal in terms of how the varied height limits will apply to this area of the south end. So these are just a couple very hypothetical renderings that our office made to help communicate those potential changes. The first one just looks at some very simple massing that looks at open areas of the sites that we're considering rezoning kind of from a high level. But the next image gives a better perspective of what it might be like to be on a street within this new district after it's developed. So, this is the pedestrians perspective of, you know, walking down a hypothetical new street on 125 Lakeside, which is today a surface parking lot, really looking north towards the existing innovation center there in the distance. And then the final image. Again, we've had a lot of conversation about understanding that this district is, you know, a part of an existing neighborhood and community and wanting to better understand how these new buildings will fit within the context of the south end. So this is an image that we've talked a lot about over the course of this discussion that looks at the view west over these sites from Callahan Park, the kind of northwest corner of Callahan Park by the soccer fields. And you can really see that we're talking about buildings that are between 65 and 85 feet in different parts of the district and this just helps us understand how that might look from a vantage point up on the hill. Did you want me to tee up the potential topics that the council will talk about tonight or do you want to go to other remarks first mayor. Thanks Megan. I think let's hear from our partners and then we can finish with a little bit of discussion about some of the amendments that are expected tonight so Thank you for that. Next, we are happy to be joined today by Russ Scully. Again, Russ has been a major innovator in many parts of the city who live on the waterfronts with the spot on the dock and grateful for you join us here today Russ. Thank you mayor thank you Megan great to be here. Thank you for putting this together. I just want to say that I'm very supportive of the overlay district idea, particularly the concept of introducing residential development to the south end. I think that I'm particularly very excited about converting this surface parking lot into an opportunity to increase our housing stock in Burlington. As you all know we've been really underserved in terms of new housing supply in the in the city of Burlington for quite some time now. You know this, this reality has become even more clear to us, particularly as a business owner in the south end with few restaurants, some retail businesses were really focused on this property will uniquely some workforce housing which we also desperately need. And so I'm particularly excited about that. We've also got you know the connectivity with our tech incubator space at hula, where we're reminded daily about the challenges of trying to find housing as new employees move to Vermont to take on new careers at growing companies in and around hula. So, we're particularly excited about kind of this new way forward this is a big step for Burlington really excited about the steps that have taken place so far. So I'm really excited about the leadership in the office within the city right now to see this as an opportunity to recognize the, the, how critical the timing is right now to do this and to really see the opportunity in converting these underutilized lots into something that can be much more beneficial to the community. So thank you. Thank you Russ, and just for members of the media are watching this I think this is clear but just want to be explicit about it if there's any confusion. We shared months ago that Russ's group ride your bike, Champlain College and the city were in discussions about whether some kind of joint effort, some kind of coordinated effort to redevelop the parcels that substantial parcels these institutions own it, that are within the strict district that those stocks are ongoing, and they are still ongoing, and when we hope to be back and another briefing soon to be able to share with you some progress with those stocks and some sense of where that would go. This is not that announcement today this is an announcement about the zoning that is before the council, and that is a prerequisite to really any of the plans that we've talked about being possible, and so more to come soon from this these discussions tonight is today is about the zoning. With that, I want to go next to Colin Hilliard from the Burlington Business Association. The BBA has been a real partner on housing issues for many years now and I know has been advocating strongly for this change Colin thank you for joining us today. Thank you Mayor Weinberger also wanted to thank the planning department planning commission and members of the city council ordinance committee, all who put in a great deal of time and effort to get this proposal where it is today. Going back to 2021. My name is Colin Hilliard and a deputy director of the Burlington Business Association. The BBA enthusiastically supports the proposed changes to create a southern innovation district. It's well known that Burlington has a housing crisis is first called out in the 2014 downtown housing strategy report. And it's been more recently highlighted in the building homes together campaigns October report that found that Chittin County is traveling behind the target of 5000 new homes by 2025 area businesses continuously report the lack of both housing availability and affordability is one of the top challenges that they face. We've heard stories from countless local businesses about the challenge of hiring staff simply because they can't find housing. And too many employees must commute from outside Chittin County when they want as to just bike or walk to work. It's for these reasons that over 17 southern businesses employing over 750 people have signed on to a letter of support of this proposal. The zoning amendment would allow for surface level parking lots and other underutilized spaces to be transformed into mixed use vibrant multimodal community for the next century. Most importantly, it would allow Burlingtonians to live near where they work and play, and that means countless positive impacts for our climate. The BB and its members. The BB and its members hope to see further advances in housing just like this one and the ones that have been discussed on the 10 point housing action plan with more members of our community saying yes to more neighbors and yes in my backyard. Thanks again mayor. Great. Thank you, Colin. Next, I want to ask to join us Jack Tiano from B pop for monitor people oriented places. He's been part of a very consistent and impressive effort to engage this issue have people and we very much welcome it. Thanks for joining us today, Jack. Hi. My name is Jack Tiano, and I'm speaking as a resident of the south end as a studio member of generator in the heart of the proposed south and innovation district. A graduate of Champlain College and as a member of, but not specifically a spokesperson for a grassroots advocacy group called reminders for people oriented places which is a pretty decentralized network of a lot of people just trying to co educate people about the issues that are affecting our cities and where we need to go from here from a lot of different angles. So I think I stand out a bit on this roster of speakers right as perhaps the only person who's not professionally involved with city functions and planning development housing commerce. I'm just an average resident who nonetheless finds more and more of my time being taken up by conversations and advocacy at the intersection of all these things and more. Another person, which I think I can say for at least another month until later in 30, who's also stuck renting. I've been acutely exposed to the uncertainty that the housing crisis brings to planning my future. And at the same time the climate crisis manifests itself more and more each year as we've experienced this year through the late spring frost that killed many crops the unrelenting wildfire smoke that has been a damper on outdoor recreation and the recent devastating floods that need no wildfire. I set the stage because though, through any individual lens updating the zoning ordinance can be seen as a small win or loss for some specific outcome. But when we look through many bigger lenses and look at the root causes I believe that it's a lot more consequential increased housing density allows us to generate more city tax revenue per acre to serve more people with city taxes at less cost per capita and alleviates supply restrictions that push housing costs out of control mixed use neighborhoods give cities vibrancy and character and foster local economies, integrating housing work and commerce gets people out of cars which is the necessity to take the climate crisis seriously. And the proposed south and innovation district is a huge step in the right direction for Burlington, aiming to create a dense lively urban environment. The city staff has done a phenomenal job of keeping the needs of Burlington in mind and being forward thinking in its incorporation of open space green space light air and verticality without risking density. Even though the zoning ordinance describes a neighborhood that I would like to live in it's also the kind of neighborhood that Burlington needs right now, both to make a dent in the housing crisis but also to set an example for the rest of the city and show a path forward, to see what an urban Vermont can and should look like in the century of climate instability. I look forward to seeing how this district develops into a physical form, and I hope that all the stakeholders are excited to build a neighborhood that truly fosters car free living and strong connectivity to expanding active transportation network. I also look forward to continuing this conversation of how our zoning ordinances are powerful tools and building stronger more vibrant more affordable and less energy intensive in the smaller scale but hopefully wider reaching neighborhood code assessment. So, thank you. Jack thank you for that very clear statement. Next, we have President Alex Hernandez president of Champlain College. I'm proud to see a recent alumnus playing such a leadership role in the community. Absolutely. Absolutely. Thank you mayor and I look forward to meeting you Jack where the best parts of my job is seeing our students that go out in the world to do a great incredible thing so thank you for your testimony Jack. Champlain College, we've been part of the south end since 2011 it's where our students go, we have the Miller Center there, our students go there to get career focused experiences and partnership with the community so couple examples of that we have the Leahy Center for cybersecurity where our students go and they defend the networks of local businesses and nonprofits right here in Burlington. We have a partnership with Hula to support entrepreneurship we have our eSports arena so this is an area that we care a lot about. And our mission as a college is to help students be ready to be ready for work and ready for lives ready for life and the reason we're so enthusiastic about this project is you know we believe the south end. You know this innovation districts being proposed is exactly the type of community that can help people launch their lives. It's a live work play learn community that can provide affordable housing. You know I'll just echo what some other folks have said you know we see the impact of the housing crisis every day on our employees on our students on our employer partners who are employing our students. It's a real it's a real impact that's holding us back and I'm really excited about the solutions being proposed here. It's a place where you know people can get employment and career focused experiences where they can really launch their lives and we're proud to be an academic partner in this district and help people learn. And I've tried to put my money where my mouth is I'm personally invested in the success of this community. I taught entrepreneurship last spring right in the south end at Hula to help our students understand the incredible opportunities that exist and you know it just made me more and more convinced of the incredible potential this area has to really further you know the hopes and dreams of people are trying to make a life here in Burlington so you know with that said Champlain College really excited to help bring this vision to life. We're thankful to the city for their leadership in this effort and grateful to the city council for considering this proposal this evening. Great thank you very much. And our final speaker another great partner to the city is Michael Monty, the executive director of Champlain Housing Trust. For so long Champlain Housing has been a key city partner and never felt that more strongly than over the last couple years as on so many fronts we've been trying to combat these homelessness challenges together. And while doing that Michael's also his team is planning these future expansions of permanent housing in many parts of Burlington and other parts of Chittenden County in the state. This is an example. We hope for that and I'm grateful. If we can create the zoning that makes it possible. Very hopeful Champlain will end up building some permanently affordable housing there in partnership with the city and others so Michael thank you for joining us. Thank you mayor and let me first speak to you as a 38 year old resident, 38 year old, 38 year resident. You're not 38 years old. No, not 38 years. 38 year resident of the south end who watched three shifts happen at the general electric plant and who watched rooms being made at the property adjacent to my home to sort of see the transition now over those many years and also as a father of a son who was at an art studio in the south end for the last 15 years, and also as a former Cito director, who supported the creation of the arts business district of creation that blended arts business and culture in Burlington, south end who for our times felt really well carefully on a notion of creating housing in the south end district, feeling right now the importance of including housing and that this zoning ordinance actually as it's written creates the balance of housing, commerce, arts, and business in a district that I think makes a sense. I applaud the city for the last year or two of planning applaud the city urge the city council to vote and support this unanimously. I think this is balancing the range of opportunities and needs in the south end and creates sort of the opportunity for creating a just not only market rate housing but affordable housing for Burlington artists and many others so thanks mayor for inviting me here. Thank you again for being part of it. Okay, and with that. I think the best way to do this is next to have Megan come back here and let's talk in a little bit more detail about the decisions in front of the council tonight and I do want to, first of all, say thank you to particularly the members of the expanded city council ordinance who have worked hard on this zoning ordinance for months for months, that is, the chair of that committee has been traverse also serving on that committee, our counselors, Sarah high tower Sarah carpenter and Joan Shannon, and I am grateful that after substantial discussion, the ordinance was passed out of that committee by unanimous vote. After a marathon meeting, I think it was an over five hour meeting if we're not mistaken right Megan, and got this to the council floor tonight and we are very hopeful and optimistic about passage of the zoning. There were several issues that were left to be resolved at the, by the by the full council, and why don't you walk us through those many. Great. I think I'm having a little bit of trouble with my video so I'm just here as a voice but thank you for pulling the slide back up. As you had indicated mayor the Council's ordinance committee did spend quite a bit of time deliberating and discussing what was in the proposal when it came to them earlier this spring. And I think they have advanced a number of recommendations that are in the ordinance itself, including some changes to the height area map that I shared earlier, and some other tweaks to the amendment itself that actually came out of that unanimous vote that they took a few weeks ago. So, these amendments here that we're talking about are the ones that are on the agenda for tonight's deliberation there are four. First is an additional tweak really this is a little bit of unfinished business from the committee's work a few weeks ago to fine tune how much surface parking the ordinance will allow to be created as part of individual developments in this district. The original version kept a fairly tight limit on how many, and how much of a lot could be dedicated to surface parking again and with the intent to facilitate more intensive development for housing and and business purposes. And this would allow for just a modest expansion, in order to deal with the realities of making that transition from a car oriented culture to a car light or car free culture over time. The second, the second amendment was introduced by a counselor that would really limit the ability for any developments in this area that include housing to take advantage of building inclusionary units offsite or paying a fee and in lieu of building those units. These are two tools that are available in some parts of the city under specific circumstances to help meet the 15% inclusionary requirement that I mentioned before. And this amendment would really limit those tools so that this neighborhood not only develops as mixed use, but develops as mixed income within the the lots that are developed in this area. The next amendment is about has suggested to prohibit dormitories as a permitted use in this district. We have had many discussions about the wide range of residential and non residential uses that should be allowed in the south end in order to meet the combination of goals that all of the community and all of the stakeholders are trying to advance. I'm concerned specifically about the use of dormitories and one of the amendments would propose to eliminate that from this district. And then the final amendment, similar to number three, a lot of discussion about whether or not lodging specifically hotels should be a tool within the redevelopment of the south end innovation district to support the needs of businesses and that are working in collaboration with partners and the city, you know, business district in the city in general, whether or not hotel should be some part of the mix of mixed use development in this area. At the conclusion of the committee's discussion, they had discussed removing this as a permitted use from the south end innovation district. One of these amendments would restore this as a use that would be allowed under very tight parameters, specifically only allowing one per lot only allowing them south of Lakeside Avenue within this new district, only allowing them in new buildings not in conversions of existing buildings and limiting the amount of a building that could be dedicated to that use really to continue to ensure that we see mixed use buildings on these sites. So these are the four amendments that the city council will discuss tonight as they consider the overall package of the south end innovation district itself. Okay, thank you for walking through that Megan. I think that there will be some debate around particularly the hotel and the dormitory amendments and but I appreciate, I hope is not lost in that debate is the much larger policy change that is in the heart of this rezoning and that I'm hopeful will have strong support tonight and to really make this important policy change. So, with that, I think we've made it through our program and we'd be happy to answer any questions if there are something median. We've done this in the past as Courtney is demonstrating if you can use the raise hand function and then Samantha will turn on your microphone. Hi Mayor, can you hear me. Yes, go ahead. Okay, so I'm wondering I don't know who would be the one to answer this but could someone speak to why the section of land north of Lakeside Avenue. It's changed to be limited to six stories instead of eight that originally there was a larger north of land in that section that would have allowed eight stories and I'm wondering if that was due to neighbors concerns. I came up because I missed that marathon ordinance committee. Someone can fill me in there. Yeah, I'm happy to speak to this. I think Courtney you actually started to address the specific concern I know that the height, the proposed height overlay map was something that was discussed extensively over the course of the process to put this amendment together. And there were some concerns about the upland views of new developments in this area specifically from Callahan Park so the committee the city council's ordinance committee carefully reviewed some of those renderings that I shared there at the very end of my remarks and evaluated the potential for development across the various sites in this district and ultimately agreed to just limit the height to six stories. So the portion of the district kind of immediately west between Callahan Park and the lake. In order to minimize the visual impact of new buildings in this area. So, the other portions of the district in red retain the ability for that eight stories. Okay, great. And Mayor, could you comment on, if you think that that is a detriment to this overall goal, you know, to have taller buildings. I would say Courtney is, if the council takes this action tonight, it is an enormous step forward for housing in the south end and for the city and whereas, you know, if it was all up to me, I'm not sure I would agree that there was an adjustment that need to be made. I think it is a minor change in comparison to the very substantial meaningful change to legalize housing and allow a very, very significant amount of building to take place throughout the community, including that area and six six story buildings are substantial for this community so I don't think that should be seen as a dramatic weakening of this of this critical change. Thanks all for me. Great. Thank you Courtney thanks for being here and your long attention to this issue. I see several other members of the media. The first is, will not see any other hands though so if that does not change in the next few moments here. We'll say there, of course this will, this is one of the first items of business tonight, there will be a public hearing and then the council will take this up and have the ability to pass this tonight, the way the way the system works this has now been warned it's the second reading, and if the council has the ability to pass it tonight, as well as to adopt the warned amendments and pass them tonight as well if something totally new comes up tonight that could require them to spend more time on this but we're we're hopeful that this is on the cusp of going forward. Any more, any more hands from the media so I do want to say to the many partners that joined us let's call thank you thanks for joining us and making this happen thank you for all your work that's led till today, and we will see many of you in just a few hours at the council meeting. Thanks everybody.