 Welcome everybody. My name is Carter. I'm on the steering committee for the MPA and I'm our facilitator tonight. I feel weird not having Tom up here and doing it myself. But yeah, Tom and Carol are both traveling or otherwise in this boat. So we're stuck with me tonight. So, yeah, I got my agenda right here. So like always, we're just going to go around share name what street you're on do formal introductions, and then we'll do announcements so like sharing events, any community activities, etc. And I see there's a mic right there and there do we want to start on the side of the room and sort of move our way around. Hi, my name is Harry. I live on Dan's court. I'm Robert also in Dan's court. I'm Jasper also on Dan's court. Yeah, it's like a little boys up a roller. It's a little private. Hi, my name is Michelle. We actually live in Essex Junction, but here as a guest. Welcome. My name is Emily. I live on Prospect Hill. Yeah, there's another mic down there too. Okay, I'm Karen long on Henry Street. I'm Catherine for man I live on North Street. Richard Hill yard. I grew up court. And I think the last people to be at an MPA from Dan's court was David Zuckerman. So that dates that. It's still owns property there. I'm Pat ceiling I live on Nash place. Hi, I'm Tim Doherty. I live on colonial square. And my son Sam, who lives with me on colonial square. I am Dave Colley. I live on Nash place and part of the old East end. Cholokalata on 20 chase street old East end. Samantha at 20 chase street old East end as well. I have Troy Hedrick. I live on billy do court. I also am one of two state reps serving shouldn't 15 in the house. Brian's coming shortly. The other one. Hi, I'm Jonathan chapel so cool. I live on North prospect street and I. I'm just watching Charlie do hand signals. So I'm. This stays over here. Okay, Jonathan chapel, so North prospect street and I'm on the steering committee as well. And I live on North. Is that everybody? Do we miss anybody? Oh, yeah, I forgot about you all. I'm sorry. Oh, and there's Carol. Do the folks on zoom want to jump in and maybe Carol and Gary, you could start. I am Carol Livingston. I live on color cohort. I'm on the steering committee. And I'm Gary gold on the school commissioner. For the east district for new people. Includes Lord one. So we went. And we'll be standing. What goes next? I think you got it. Yeah. I'm Gina. Sharon, you want to send it? Oh, sure. East Avenue. And then, oh, that's just Sam. Carter newbies are I'm over on Colchester Colchester Avenue. I almost said Clark O'Court. Sweet. So. Any announcements before we move to speak out. Just community events. I think that's happening that you want to share with folks. Yeah, Carol. So, along with the old East and I, and Dave have been putting together a project to assess walkability, livability. Traffic issues, infrastructure issues. We're calling it the people powered neighborhood project. It has its first tent. Pop up event this Friday and we'll have another on Sunday. These will be announced in front porch forum. But if you have time on Friday or Sunday, keep your eyes open for the tent down at triangle park on chase street. We'll be looking for input on how the neighborhood can be more walkable more livable. We're not going to be able to deal with the amount of traffic that comes through there, but we are hoping to. Send the message that this is a space for people where people live and where residents can thrive. We're hoping to get input and collect data from residents so that we can do some projects coming in the fall. Anything I missed with it. So we'll be calling for volunteers. I'm not going to rattle off the whole list right now, but keep your eyes posted on front porch forum. If you'd like to help out, we'll have opportunities all throughout the summer. If you're in Centennial. Yeah. Yeah. If you might want to post like I'm in one East. Yeah. Make sure you go to all the. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Sure. I think don't, don't I have the option to share it's a neighboring communities. Yeah, but it won't. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I think we can make sure it gets around to the surrounding areas. Any other announcements? So this is. This is the, I think that's the last NPA meeting for the spring on. So, on July 15. The Fletcher free library will be celebrating it's 150th anniversary. And there's going to be a parade down church street where you can. Go and dress up as your favorite character or your favorite author. And then there are all sorts of events at the library itself. Cake. Music entertainment. And this will be, this will be on July 50th. It'll be on the Saturday. And you're all welcome to come there will be more notices on front porch forum and around on it, but we hope to have a good turnout. Thanks. Who are you going as well? I'm working on my Charles Darwin beard actually. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to make it because it's so irritating. But. I have one quick one. We, this is the last meeting of those September. For NPA in person. So we're taking July just as a reminder, July and August off. And then. July 9th is the community picnic. August 9th, sorry. Yeah, August 9th, we're doing a picnic at Shaman's Park and we'll send out more details on FBF and the email list. And great plug. If you didn't sign in, but you want to get emails about just NPA agendas and then wrap up in any community events we mentioned. Just make sure you sign in and put your email down and you'll get on that. We're. I think at 45 folks and growing so we're getting there. Sweet. All right, any more going once, going twice. That's being last meeting. I have a feeling this is Sam's last meeting with us. Is that right? So, I think we all Sam really deserves a lot of praise and applause for all the incredible hard work he's done over the last couple of years in keeping this and every NPA meeting running. So, yeah, I think he's been really, really, really smooth. Smoothly, efficiently, dealing with in person and on the TV. Just all the help you've given us everything you've done for us has been so appreciated. You're you've got, are they big shoes, little shoes, their shoes to follow in. That we really, we're just so happy that you could could give us all you've given us in the last couple years. So I just wanted to say thank you. Thank you. No, she didn't clap. Carol, did you have anything you want to share as well? Or you might be person. It was just, I was just going to. Thanks. And I'm glad Jonathan went ahead and did that. I also. As a student throughout the city is the steering committees of each of the eight wards has an all wards meetings are twice a year and Sam's been instrumental in facilitating those and ensuring that we, we have those meetings and are able to sort of share our ideas and together. Thank you so much for that leadership. You broke up a little bit Carol, but I think we, we did get most of it in the, in the gist. Okay, I guess we'll move to any other. Yeah, move to speak out unless there's any other announcements. We're officially in speak out. So speak out you can share anything on your mind. We put 20 minutes on the, on the clock before city council updates. Could be about anything in the community issues in front of city council, city government. All those good things. Yeah, Richard. I received a call in the middle of the night from Jared Wood. So I'm representing what he would find absolutely appalling. I heard from a pretty unimpeachable source last week that the city gains revenue of about one and a half million dollars a year from parking parking offenses. And they don't gain anything from traffic enforcement because there isn't any. But the before that policy was put in place. We only got 50,000 from traffic enforcement fines and that sort of thing. I know that police lieutenant that I worked with. Issued $2,000 worth of fines in a two hour detail. And I know public safety is later in the in the agenda. But I wonder whether we're doing these things right. We're not. It's not safe not to have any traffic enforcement. In certain other countries that someone was fined $127,000 in Finland a few weeks ago for a traffic offense. A well known soccer player was fined $92,000 in Newcastle in England. And fairly recently, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, believe it or not. Just after the coronation got done for going 33 and a 30 mile an hour limit and had to pay about 250 bucks. So, I would urge anyone who is influential in this to assess whether or not we're serving the public and public safety well by concentrating more enforcement on parking offenses and not on speeding going through red lights and all the rest of the stuff I see when I'm a crossing guard. So, thanks for listening. Thank you, Jared. Carter. Yeah, Sharon I got you in the queue but Charlie you want to add something quick. Okay, so people might be interested to know that beginning just before Christmas, the number of people actually writing tickets increase from about three people to 13. For parking enforcement. So that might have something to do with it. I'm not back as we both then thought below the place. Yeah, Sharon I saw you want to jump in though. Yes, I wanted to say that. I think that the counselors that were on the council at 2019 or so. The police commission, you know, did a report on traffic stops and there was a correlation between people's race and the number of times they were stopped. And the way that this community and not just our community but others in Vermont dealt with that was to stop doing traffic stops. And I that isn't really solving the problem. If you have a problem that suggests discrimination, you have to address why that's happening, you don't just stop enforcement. I got this up. And I thank you, Richard for mentioning this. I think that the counselors that will be ones here and I don't know if Sarah is on on on the call on the meeting but I think the council needs to needs to address that with the police to begin that again and I understand that there's a relative risk, but then you need to address that discrimination, you don't just let violators go through it's very frustrating. But while I have this moment, I wanted to bring to your attention that, you know, I, I still follow the city council and board of finance meetings, and I speak now at the board of finance and council is about to do one of their most important things is to adopt the budget that the mayor presents. And I have voice concern, because there are some increases, and you also know that there's going to be a rate increase for BED water and wastewater. And the there is charter authority to allow the council without asking the public to increase the amount of money that is dedicated to parks it's a tree belt ordinance. I unfortunately know about that because it was done years ago when I was on the council, but, but they're going to increase that and so they did do a synopsis at the last meeting, and they said for a house that was paid at $370,000 the anticipated impact would be $207 per year school tax. Once again that's income sensitive so for those that are struggling, there may be relief from the state. But for the city, it would be $136 that's the tax that doesn't increase the increase for the utilities that I referenced and I spoke because I feel that the council needs to look at the affordability. Mayor has asked added a lot of positions and reclassified a lot of positions. And although I want to absolutely compensate people fairly. We used to look at what was recommended and then put this overlay of what burling Tonians could afford. And I spoke to the fact that I think that that process of that overlay for affordability has been lost. And that's not going to only impact homeowners because it's going to impact renters also. And so I'm very concerned as I live here and hear more people thinking that they might have to move out of Burlington that have lived here a long time. And I just wanted to share that with this NPA, because I care about us and I wanted all of you to know. Thank you. Yeah, thanks Sharon. Thank you. And Mike Sharon, I agree. I know people who have moved out people that are my age that lived here a long time because our taxes are ridiculous. And I also echo what Richard said, but it was del pozo and John Murad who came to our NPA, maybe five years ago, and said, they don't do traffic tickets because it hurt people's morale. People remember it. Yeah. And so Cindy, Cindy Cook got somebody to do like a speed thing on East Avenue. And I think it was a four hour thing. Or you did it. Well, you and Cindy. Anyway, whatever I just remember it. And it was all they collected because there's people speeding on East Avenue all the time and they got a lot of money. They just once they only did it. So I agree they should be, you know, changing that so that people are not being hit on the street when they're walking more people would walk if they felt it was safer. And what my speak out was about was I did go to the Duke meeting last night about the BED plan to build the pipeline for the steam from the intervail up to UVM $42 million. There are six panelists BED. They're really like for that seem kind of, you know, for it, but we did have two scientists that they had brought. And it was really, really good. And it was not disputed that it is more polluting to run McNeil on wood chips than if we use natural gas. We really, I think we need to shut that down. And that was what I feel came out of the meeting last night you can go online and they are going to put all the slides everything that was on the meeting last night will be up for you to look at. But the scientists had said that wood burning, you know, it generates more greenhouse gases than using the natural gas, and we are using chips that, you know, the excess there are foresters there there are a lot of people in the audience talking. Those chips could also be used for insulation, and they could also be used in compressed board, it doesn't have to be burned that they call it the wastewood from when they're lumbering. There were several Burlington residents that spoke about the accounting that BED is doing, and they really were, you know, kind of angry, because they feel that BED is not being honest with their accounting. And I do hope our counselors will really look into this because we, I think we're being sold this that, oh, it's a great thing for us, but I don't think it is. And in Massachusetts, they have already outlawed burning wood for energy. So anyway, it was a really good it was from like 630 to 930 last night it was a great meeting and there are things on the internet that you can look up and see what they said. So thank you. Not to jump the queue but I worked for 350 Vermont and this this thinking about McNeil is one of our, our like biggest focuses right now because at scale burning biomass wood, wood chips is worse than burning coal or most fossil fuels and so And that's relatively new science like I think one of the panelists who was a scientist they brought in said like, you know, to Darren at one point because I was live streaming because I couldn't make it down there because of work but said at one point look like what you, you know, getting McNeil up and running and investing in it made sense 20 years ago. And like, because that's what science was available but yeah. But like since 2015 there's like a ton more data on true impacts on the actual emission impacts. But there was one interesting. Not to take up too much time but one thing I did think was really fair that I took away from that meeting was like, you know, if I had my way I'd shut down McNeil tomorrow, but the reality is it is providing a market to create a forestry industry in Vermont and so I think we do need to start thinking about as a city. You know, it was a little frustrating because I was like, let's get creative like we literally created that market as a city as a government. So we have clearly the ability to create a market for paying folks to manage their land to capture carbon, or, you know, thinking of just creative solutions to, you know, one of the things they said for like using it for different wood products was that they're just starting that like it's mostly in Europe I think they said some things opening in Maine, some factory. So, I don't know, it seems like a very tough problem but something we got to make sure we're keeping folks whole on. I'll stop ranting I'll get off my soapbox. So Karen and if someone wanted to watch that video from last night where we day find it. Okay, so CCTV, CCTV filmed it. And so one way to find it is either on YouTube but it's a little more difficult but if you can simply go to on your computer, CCTV.org. And you put in last night's date, which is June, June 13, then everything that CCTV film that day will pop up on your screen. So you can go to CCTV.org, but the date and June 13. Thank you. Yeah, thanks Charlie. Any other speak up. I have one question about this project. Is this it. My understanding from what you said this is not a done deal, because I was, it's going to tear up. I think it's going to be a great way that we are getting so invested in it and certainly the, the administration, I feel is going to support BED, because it's jobs they said that last night's jobs for them but again, we have to we are all in this with the earth and the climate change I mean, and that was I felt so impressive last night. Because in yes the foresters, they need to make money on their wood, but they, they do you know what they said last night they get $1 a ton for wood chips $1, because they really sell their wood for the lumber. So they're not making much money on the wood chips. Okay, so that's not my question. I'm sorry. So, I understand, I understand the thing about the plant, the wood chip plant. I understand the piece about the steam, because I was just told they're going to tear up North Street, right $42 million to do a pipeline to transfer the steam from McNeil. They showed a map last night of where it will go will actually go on Mansfield go up North Street, I believe, prospect probably North Street Mansfield and up. And yes, they did show that. So, I think it's important for electricity and heat for the medical center, and yeah. Yeah, and I would just say, like, to be fair to them their argument is, yes, this is not the greatest from missions, but we're trying to just invest to make it as efficient as possible. I think on the flip side of that, the only reason that McNeil is economically viable, even if you don't care about climate, and you're just looking at as looking at it as an energy source is because it gets highly subsidized through renewable energy and wood is considered like it is included in that subsidy. However, New York, Massachusetts and other folks in the region, more and more like New York and Massachusetts both don't consider biofuels as they don't include them for subsidies. One of the people who came up from Massachusetts last night made the point that, you know, in 10 years, 20 years, we nobody knows for sure, because you can't read the future but it's very, very possible that it won't be included in terms of the subsidy from a renewable energy credit so then we're going to be totally underwater and have spent 42 million for investing in an energy plant that we may not be able to economically operate and anywhere from 10 to 30 years. Anyway, I'm biased. You can tell, but any other things on speak out folks wanted to talk to or speak to rather. Yes, Carol. Oh yeah Carol. Hi, and I apologize that I'm not there but Michelle Giles was going to speak during this. This time is she in the room. Yeah. This would be the time Michelle. Okay, okay great. Right, right, right. Yeah, so my name is Michelle. I'm a graduate student at the University of Vermont, and I'm doing a project in Centennial Woods this summer and it's so cool. Yeah, there's a map of Centennial Woods up there. So, has ever have many people visited Centennial Woods. Yeah, cool. Lots of head nods. Awesome. So, you said you say every day. We should go on a walk sometime. I would love to. We met in the garden. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, Peter and Charlie ended up barging into their garden and planting tomatoes with them. They graciously hosted me for about an hour. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you, NPA and also old East End neighborhood coalition for prompting me to speak tonight but I have I'm one of the things and I one of the goals I have is to improve the accessibility of the trails in Centennial Woods. I'm specifically interested in the feasibility of an ADA accessible loop so a loop that would be accessible to wheelchairs strollers, walkers, canes, multi multi use. And there's, you know, lots that goes into this but I think community feedback is something that I'm really interested in. And Sam, would you mind just scrolling just a tiny bit down. Okay, yeah, I put my email on the bottom there. And so you're all each individually invited to email me and let me know your thoughts on the trails in Centennial. I don't want to hear more about it but the, the point that I'm thinking for the access is the sort of Southwest entrance that's off Kerrigan Drive. Yeah, yeah, you're on it. Yeah, awesome. And that's like known as the access trail. There's a lot of different names for it. Everybody kind of has their own but because there's parking there, which would be accessible for people. So, there's a lot of things going into it but yeah, I'm, I'm, I can take questions about it too if people have questions right now that was just sort of like a broad spew of information and thoughts but and you're also welcome to email me. Yeah. Yeah. I'm thinking for people to know what you think about public engagement. What UVM is thinking about public engagement on Centennial Woods. That was news to me. Yeah. Well, there's no, there's no like unified thing behind Centennial Woods and public engagement. The Centennial Woods is 69 acres of it is known as a natural area. And then natural areas are open to the public and students for recreation and you're supposed to be enjoyed by the public and students for recreation and then also for like research and studies so that's kind of the goal of a natural area and the UVM has nine of them so Centennial Woods is one and it's just local and I think a lot of people maybe go there. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah. So with a natural area. There's trails already through there. Yeah. And so, I said, you know, Centennial hasn't been left completely wilded. Are those trails maintained and then does the trail maintenance tie into any sort of responsibility to keep people safe or is there any sort of like official stance on maintenance and safety anything like that. There's sort of the folks who work for the natural areas, kind of cruise the trails from time to time and do like, they can snap photos of areas of concern and then there's like grounds management that can come in and clear certain areas. There's like, you can reach out to forestry sometimes forestry gets involved with issues and concerns, but there's like nobody whose job it is to walk Centennial Woods and identify concerns and address them. There's no, like single person. Yeah. Can I ask a question. Yeah. Hi, I'm Sharon, and I believe that UVM, although that parcel of land is is involved in the campus I thought the agency of natural resources actually managed that. Okay. The, the land is the development rights are owned by the Vermont land trust. And in fact, they can come by every like, five years and inspect that UVM is upholding what they said they would do which is mostly that UVM promises not to develop the 69 acres that are the natural area. So yeah, they're, they're welcome to come by anytime and they can. But to my knowledge I haven't seen any documents that indicate that they have. So the reason that happened is because the acreage was much larger. It's and Jared would would have been able to speak to this it was something like 90. Well 90 that was however many acres but now it shrunk. And, and some of that was the, the feeling from the state that UVM hadn't been good stewards. And so I just wanted to point that out so I wasn't quite sure. When you are speaking about this, if you need to inform the land trust or whoever you mentioned about this upgrade that was my question. There's no, I mean, I would inform the Vermont land trust, but it falls within the guidelines of what UVM is allowed to do on the land, because it falls under like recreation and accessible recreation. There's nothing specific about ADA accessible recreation but the land is open for recreation and and any kind of trail improvements are under that kind of category. And then, as for the acreage, you're absolutely right the whole Centennial Woods is 144 acres and 69.1 is the part that's protected by the Vermont land trust. It is not protected it's just known as like university property, with no like specific Vermont land trust guidelines that it falls under. That's complex. Thank you. Thanks for listening. And Michelle, do you care if we share your email out on like our wrap up email to everybody. Any, we're a little or eight minutes behind so any pressing speak out that folks want to sneak in. Before we move to city council updates. And I'll pass it to you. Okay. Consider it passed maybe I'll come up and I think I'm supposed to come up. So hi everyone. For those of you who don't know me, I'm Tim Doherty and I am the city council person for the East District, which constitutes wards eight and wards one. And I was elected in March of this year. I thought I would go through some of what from my perspective where the highlights of the June 5 city council meeting. Talk you briefly through my committee work and then address a couple of odds and ends and other things that I've been thinking about and working on. So, the obviously the big marquee event for the June 5 city council meeting was the votes to confirm chief Murad. I'm happy to answer questions about that. I don't think I have much more to add to the conversation. Beyond what I wrote in front porch forum or what I've written to a number of you individually or set up a meeting. The only I guess slight additional point that I might add and I think it might be somewhat responses. Some of the comments that I've heard particularly from Richard and Karen. Is is that, you know, I met extensively with chief Murad. In the weeks in the two weeks between when the mayor announced that he was going to put him up for the vote. And on June 5. And one of the things I asked chief Murad was whether he would be willing to commit to come to this NPA meeting. And I think the steering committee saw fit to invite him. And he promised me that he would. And so if, if, if that is something the committee is interested in doing. I will facilitate that. And he might be able to address directly. Some of these issues that you're talking about, particularly with respect to. And I think it's important to note that the city is not enforcing traffic enforcement, which is an issue that's near and dear to my heart as well. I have 3 children on colonial square. And it's clear that the city is not enforcing. Traffic rules and we see the effects even on colonial square. We see the effects of people. Bombing around there and it makes me apoplectic. So that invitation is open. The other, and like I said, happy to, happy to take questions about that vote. I know it was contentious and people had strong feelings about it. Another major piece that might have gotten a little bit lost in the shuffle of, of the meeting was the report from Sarah Russell and others on Burlington's anticipated response to what, what we expect to happen. When the funding for the motel voucher program runs out, I really commend everyone. There was a slide deck associated with Sarah's report. I was incredibly impressed by the work that they had done. They had done that response to a resolution that the city council voted on asking them to do that work. I won't do it justice. There's a couple of highlights to it. One is the city's anticipated. And this will require some state approval. But creation or development of another low barrier congregate shelter on chariors, Cherry street that would house 50 folks. This will be our third the city's third low barrier shelter that it that it put in place. Another component to the proposed response. None of these things are finalized, but these, this was, you know, Sarah. Talking about the plans was a 75 person day shelter. So not overnight, but a day shelter for folks experiencing homelessness. And then continued work and commitment with the CCHA to support about 165 folks from particularly vulnerable populations who they anticipate will be turned out when the motel voucher program ends. Now, I read and I know Troy's here and he might be able to help. I read this morning quickly. That there was some news that there might be some deal in the works that might move some of this. I have not had the chance to check online and see if there was anything new on digger since this morning at about 530 or six when I looked at it. But maybe at some point Troy you could fill us in on that. Obviously that would be the best solution. If the state found an alternative to doing what I think it's a disastrous. Move. So, I would love to hear more about that, but that was a big part of of my perspective on the meeting. There was some discussion about sort of a restructuring of the debt that the city's taking on or has already taken on. To do the municipal infrastructure component of the city place development. I thought that was interesting and commend people to that. I confess that I am still learning the details of that incredibly complicated financial structure. But Tim Samson came and I thought it gave a good presentation. The second time I heard his presentation and I understood more of it the second time than I did the first time. So, I commend people to that. Those were the highlights from the June city council meeting. As Sharon pointed out, looking forward. Our next major task is to approve the budget. I was able to attend almost all of the anticipatory budget meetings in which we heard from the various departments on their budgetary needs. And proposals going forward. I think I told you the last time that I was here. That what the administration in a sort of high level overview tells us is that they are anticipating some lean budget years going forward. As a result, largely of the trickling down of federal money that has contributed so greatly to our budget picture over the last couple years. For whatever it's worth. I really share these concerns that Sharon raised and I think the Karen raised about the tax burden that Berlin Tony answers are experiencing right now. I know that both renters and property owners alike. I have been struck as a brand newbie city council person. How little discussion I've seen so far devoted when we're talking about issues public policy, whether it's oversight of the police department or other aspects of public policy. And addressing adding components to city government. How little discussion, if any, I've heard so far devoted to the discussion of how we are going to fund these projects that have merit on their own but can't be considered without thinking about tax burden on Burlington taxpayers and renters who of course share that burden. Definitely something I'm going to be paying attention to as I go into my first vote on the budget. Committees. I'm on the public safety committee. We have not had a meeting since I last met with you. I am also on the joint ordinance and charter change committee. It's been a mouthful the name of the committee. It's important because that is the committee that currently is addressing. That's the committee that is currently addressing the question of police oversight. We have had a meeting since I last spoke with you. Stephanie, so we know from the police commission presented at that meeting provided her perspective and the police commission's perspective on the question of police oversight, which I found to be tremendously helpful. I'm also on the tax abatement committee. Probably the least exciting of the committees, although I'm kind of into it as a lawyer. We didn't do anything at the tax abatement committee meeting, except here from the city attorney's office. Who gave everybody on the committee of primer and a primer on the role of that committee. So that is my committee work for the last month. That is my overview of the most recent city council meeting. Other things, I guess the principal thing is I don't know. If any of you saw there was some, there was some reporting on the in which bill Ward was quoted on the question of trash and trash removal and fines associated with that. This is something that I've been hearing a lot about from constituents, some of you, some of whom are here, but many of whom are not. And I've been in communication with bill Ward and tend to continue to work with him. I don't have a specific proposal to articulate for you right now, but I am working on it. Because it's a real quality of life, health, and public safety, I think issue that we continue to have an incredible amount of trash in our greenways. My children have all gone to IA in Ward two. I regularly walk down there to this day with my eight year old, you know, and essentially we, you know, you waved through trash to get to IA. It's not acceptable. It's hard for me to believe that we can't do it a much, much better job. I do say that with some humility because I know many people have been working on this for years and years and and I don't pretend to be able to swoop in and solve it, but it's a priority of mine. And I hope to have more to report to you when we meet back again in September on that front. So that's my report, but I'd be happy to answer questions to the best of my ability. Yes. I have a housing question. I've been thinking about the building that was used to be wide on the corner of North Union and college. Yes. And I've heard that someone is privately owned by someone who has to turn it into a hotel. Yes. And I'm just wondering if you or anyone who doesn't actually knows. There's so many square feet. I don't know what the condition is inside of the sport, but I'm wondering if it's being considered for any time. Thanks. And I did attend a meeting. And I'm trying to remember what meeting it was. It was the Ward 8. Thank you. It was the Ward 8 NPA meeting in which there was a presentation. I got there late and missed most of it. There was a, it was not a presentation by the owner, but it was presentation by a local developer developer who's working with the owner. They did have some design plans there. And the discussion was the intent to make an apartment building there that would require considerable renovation. But that is a plan that is in the works. And they did talk about square footage and I apologize. I don't, I don't know what that, what the real presentation was, but I can get that for you. Because I think it was, I think it was publicly. Yeah. I don't. It was a lot. Great. It was a lot. Well, yeah, it sounded, it did the piece that I heard sounded great. You know, there were people in the neighborhood who raised concerns. Two, like it, like everything else. You know, how high it was going to be, whether it was going to block residents lights, you know, like with anything else, there are, there are pluses and minuses. So it's not that I have, I don't have an opinion right now on whether it's the right kind of development. And I, you know, I'm not being asked. I don't think the city council is anywhere close to being a place where we'd be asked to weigh in. Really speaking, the more housing we can build the better in my view. And so I'm not though. And I'm curious to know if anyone knows about. This is a lot of Christie schools of housing where the nuns live for all those years and next time. Sister's a mercy. This is not a Christie. We just put it back. There was no one's while it's where I just. There is, you know, about it. So my, I'm on Christie bought that building and it's expanding into the building. But the land is still sister to mercy land, the land that goes all the way through there. They're expanding their programs in the school. Yeah. That's what I heard as well. Not an official capacity. I just heard the building that goes to the fire station. And then there's a building that connects to the sisters of mercy building that's their middle school. And that's what's being. I think Carter's, did we decide who's calling up. I don't know, but you. Yeah, and I do it with humility, right? Like I realized that you and many others have been working on this and pushing bill and pushing others within city government and I don't mean to come in and say that. I'm going to be able to solve this problem. But, you know, Zariah had a really good idea about it relates to parking enforcement. She said, well, why can't we have, why can't we designate within, you know, you know, a certain certain time like when the students are leaving some of the parking enforcement people to do trash enforcement. That was a great idea. I don't know whether it's feasible. You know, what I am thinking about is, is a graded fine process. But I'd like it to be combined with some other things. And frankly, I'd like to get some commitment from UVM on this, you know, UVM is making overtures about wanting to be a better partner being perceived as a better partner. You know, what a great opportunity. And so, you know, I'd like, I'd like to explore that as well. Why shouldn't we have, you know, a massive, you know, why shouldn't we devote some funding and some energy toward, you know, blanketing these landlords who profit so well from renting and are mostly in the East District. And really sort of, you know, you know, they should be getting flyers, they should be getting emails, they should be getting bulletins. These are what the fines are going to be. We're going to hold you accountable. You know, then they should be passing that along to their renters, you know, and they hold the security deposits over them and we should push the burden on this. You know, I don't want to constantly talk about being a lawyer, but like there's a sort of theory of tort law, right, which is the, you know, the person who is in the best place to avoid the harm, the most efficient cost of order should pay. And who's the most efficient cost of order and all this garbage, it's the landlords. And so I will, I will, it's a priority for me. So the question about the tip that came up, the funding. So it's a huge document, and I'm sure many of the counselors didn't read it. Because and it was called. I mean, it should. Yeah, I have it right here. You have it's like. Right. Yes, it's big. It's the, my gist of it is that the city and CPP and the city play. Yep. The tip deadline. And the project lacks financing. And so the city. So they are not going to be building and meet the deadline. I think it's the end of the month. The partners. Okay. So the city, and this is words out of this. It says the city will issue interactive debt of 18,000,840,000. The circumvent deadline and conserve the tip dollars. And so on, I said this, that's the meeting. I'm going to the council meeting and Miro didn't directly say to me, but I'm saying this, but the city. And I'm saying that the city and system is not alone. But it does stay in that whole document. I think the city and the city will pay this. Because we are borrowing money. To put in this. To help out the builders. I mean, again, I think we're back in a hole just like we were back where I think we're backing ourselves in a hole. It's the field thing. Because we want everybody wants something in that. And so our bending over backwards, like this is the best borrowing deal anyone could ever get. What's the size I get with the city is giving them. Anyway, I just think that. I mean, you probably understand it way more than I do, but it is alone. I mean, we just admitted we are borrowing money to help them out, because they didn't make the deadline. And we want the building to keep going on, which I do too. But I think we should just say that yes, we are going to risk, and we don't even know they said it's uneven. They don't know what they're building in the north tower. So how do we know what we do will pay back the tip money and we are borrowing. You know what I mean, like, that's what gets me and they are putting a hotel now they did say it's not all housing, there's going to be a hotel. We don't want a hotel. We want house. So, anyway, I hate to, I feel like just like Massachusetts in New York has outlawed the fossil, you know, the burning of wood for energy. Many, many states have outlawed to funding because it is so bad for the education fund. That's we're taking education dollars and giving it, we're financing it for these bills. Anyway, I'm upset about that because I feel like they're dancing around and they're not admitting and, you know, it's the administration that we are, it is the loan that it's based in there. They're going to pay the fees that we are going to pay for our money. There's a lot, a lot, but I do feel like we are fully to risk all this money for this development that can't get financing. And now they're saying that the north tower they don't know what they'll put there. And there is going to be a hotel. And we're not going to have the part one benefit for us to be, you know, an observation deck that was going to be the city's benefit with this whole thing. We're not going to have that. I want to let Tim respond. But we are. We're late. And I do want to make sure that Gary and Achilles the time to speak and then we can get to Troy as well. But. Yeah, last thoughts. There was, there was a lot there. And, and I am trying to get up to speed on the structure. It's not my area of the law and it is complicated and there is a long history. I think I can respond to at least one aspect of your concern with the caveat that I could be mistaken or misunderstood. My understanding is the $18 million is to pay for city infrastructure. Associated with the development. It is not I do, I do not understand it to be a loan to the developers. I understand it to be money that we've, by the way, already committed to having borrowed. That we are going to pay so that the folks who are building the stuff are also going to be building streets that are go with it. They are also going to be building the sewers that go underneath the street. They are going to be building. Right. The infrastructure, the city infrastructure that in the ordinary course, the city would just pay for. But they are going to be building that stuff. They're going to be incurring costs and that we are going to have to pay them. Once they incur the cost. And my understanding of what what happened, or what's happening is that it is true that they haven't met. Financing benchmarks that were part of the original structure. I also understand and this is based upon what the attorney explained that that's very, very common. And that as a result, we have changed the way we are structuring this debt to give us more protection. But in other words, it's interim debt rather than sort of a block debt. That's my understanding of that. So I don't think I don't think it's true that we are lending the city place developers $18 million in this instance, with respect to your other concerns. I hear you. Unless we have any burning desires, I'm going to go to Gary per school school board updates. Oh, you might be frozen though, Gary. Hi everyone. Oh, now, now we got you. Okay. Not sure which end is on. So pretty quick update. It hasn't slow time. It's just a lot of what's going on is executive session that I can't share with you. We, the deconstruction at on Institute road is moving along. Building a which was the auditorium and the gym is pretty much gone. The materials still there it has to be sorted based on the PCB levels to determine where the waste will be sent. My understanding there aren't any sites of Vermont where it can end up. Because we're really only down to I think the one landfill up near Newport, and it would not take the PCB heavy material. So if you see it piling up, it's just because it has to be tested has to be sorted. But it's moving along. We're still looking at Christmas 2025 as the change over from the downtown BHS to the new building. Sorry, Sam, you're going to be gone by then, I think, or you may have one last semester there. And on that note, I know Sam said but tomorrow at noon, the schools will be out for the summer. So that's on the side. Yes. The other part is we're slightly struggling to find administrators. I think it is sort of a sign of times that trader and teachers but particularly administrators is become very difficult position to be in. You've never really made people happy being administrator but now it's impossible. And the levels of. Yeah, it's just the behavior they're seeing, which has valid sources but it's a difficult time so we have openings. Both middle school principals positions are open. And we're why that has been cast again to try to to fill those positions over the summer. So likely at this point we have the those two spots open. Tom is working hard to fill those. So, I want to give you a chance. I did have a I was this month's article in the North Avenue news or North and news. So you can read a little bit of what I've been up to this last month there and then I'll do an update this week. So, please any question. Any questions going once going twice. I'm not seeing any Gary. I think you're good. Great. All right. Thank you all. Thank you. Getting back to my agenda here. I think we're going to turn it over to Troy and Brian, if you want to come up to the table to talk about legislative updates. Senior representatives pick things off. So we're going to give you an update. I think on the budget and I'm going to talk about many strengths of the budget and then handed over to Troy to talk about a very costly error in the budget that we're hoping to fix. So, and I'm going to refer to my front porch forum post and set a timer for myself just to try to stay on track. So how do we have 10 minutes total. Yes, or has our has our probation been cut down to like seven minutes. What is the, what is the comparable do five minutes for me, five minutes for you and maybe I'll do four minutes and you, and then you can do as long as you want. I'm not managing it. So, um, yeah, so. Um, okay, well, hopefully you can hear me online. Um, so I pulling up my notes. So, um, the, the, the budget has 8.4 billion dollars and spending in it. And the, the spending invests in a mix invests a mix of state and federal dollars in a wide array of services and programs that impact or impact all sectors of the economy and people from all walks of life in Vermont. So what is the true cost of this, these policy and spending decisions true cost accounting is an approach to accounting where you look at not only the economic costs, but you look at the environmental and social costs. And too often in our society, we don't do that. So when you look at the true cost of climate change, for example, it's unpredictable, but the cost of an action has been immense. Um, and I also have mixed feelings because although it takes an important step towards addressing global warming, it doesn't take into account the full economic and social costs of energy. When it's produced as a profitable commodity in a global extractive economy. So as we create regulations to control gaseous waste, we need to keep working on how we reduce other wastes and other harm caused by energy production. We need to be maximizing the efficiency of infrastructure, especially our new infrastructure, and we need to move quickly towards localized sustainable energy production. We're making historic investments that increase access to childcare alongside improvements to unemployment and workers compensation benefits. And the long term financial savings that will come from these investments in childcare are immense because of the social determinants of health. And to the individual, in my opinion, outweighs, it justifies the long term public health benefits. For example, the best I could get was the 2021 Burlington median income because of the way data is updated. It was $34,054 in $21 for a person making that much, they would pay $12 and 50 cents more a month out of their income tax. And if they're self employed, they would only pay $3 more per month. And that additional expense from everyone allows all families sliding scale access to childcare in a better sustained system. So to me, that was a worthy investment that I stand by. The House, I'm just going to check my timer. Okay, I'm doing good. I got one minute and 33 seconds. So the House Health Care Committee advocated for major changes to our adjustments to policy and spending to assist our healthcare system after we've had years of neglect and decades of neglect and years of stress from the pandemic. So we are increasing provider rates. For example, the designated agencies and specialized service agencies are getting 5%, primary care providers are getting 10%. But we're also increasing rates for federally qualified health centers, dental providers, EMS recovery centers, nursing homes, youth service providers and more. And these rates are barely keeping up with inflation, but at least we're giving providers these rates after three years of inflation, of major inflation. The Health Care Committee also is increasing access to more mental health treatment, more beds and inpatient residential care, mobile crisis expansion around the state and peer support services are rolling out. We're continuing incentives for recruitment and retention of health and human services workers. We expanded efforts to prevent death by suicide firearms and overdose at a time when we have record level suicide and record level overdoses. And we're promoting health equity and addressing disparities through funding of the Health Equity Advisory Commission. And then, although access to clinical healthcare is an important social determinant of health, it only has 20% impact on health outcomes while other social determinants like education, employment, poverty have a 50% impact. So if an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, then we need to be consciously thinking about how to reinvest money over time into those social determinants of health because the long-term savings outweigh the cost. And so speaking of the social determinants of health, one major area that we worked on this session was housing and another is incarceration. I don't know what you plan to speak to, but I thought those might be two. So you would. Housing, all right, so I'm going to hand it over to Troy. I'm going to just kind of do the big picture of where the budget is right now, right. So the budget passed the House, the budget passed the Senate, and was vetoed by the governor. And as a veto proof, it had veto proof support in the Senate, it did not have veto proof in the House. The five progressives, Brian and I, along with the three other progressives, along with 12 Democrats, voted no on the budget, and we voted no on the budget because we did not think it did. And all that it could have, especially with regard to the sudden impact it was going to have on the 2800 some plus people who were housed by the, the voucher program, the hotel voucher program. So we all, we spent some time and that in those fine in that final debate talking about why we could not support the budget as it was written with the absence of any support for for the folks who are about to get evicted. That has already started. The first group of people who were evicted happened on June 1. There were five, maybe six hotels where the owner of the hotels gave a grace period a two week grace period that ends tomorrow. So the 15th. I think the number is close to 300 or 400 more people will be evicted. And many of those people arriving to Burlington is that we'll definitely notice. And then the next set of evictions is scheduled for July 1. Since the, the House left session. The 17 of us who voted now have been meeting regularly once twice a week. That number kind of might have, we may have attracted more. It may be as high as 25 of us. We have written a policy. So to solve this problem. And we can do this. There are a few ways that this could resolve itself. I think the best way is that we create a policy that funds the continued housing for the folks who are in the hotel voucher program. And gives them a much smoother off ramp into the services that the budget that Brian was just talking about does provide for folks who are needing shelter. And that has been written that has been delivered to house leadership. It is, there's a group of three folks who are negotiating with house leadership as to how much of that they would be willing to consider. It's a policy it's not, it's not reopening the budget. And in the meantime, so the joint fiscal committee is a group of folks from the house and the Senate, who continue to meet, even when we're not in session. They have been putting their heads together and are presenting their own proposal to the governor and the administration. And they have been talking about how they're essentially doing a bit of an about face. I think that's how Vermont digger caused what Vermont digger called it and they have realized that this is too abrupt. I think they also realize that there are at least 17 of us who are not willing to override the veto until this gets fixed. So the handwriting is on the wall for them. There's a lot to be optimistic about. We haven't seen the details of their proposal yet. I've been checking my notes because that meet that group of us is meeting, you know, as we're meeting. And I think I did see an update about how their proposal differed from ours, but I hesitate to say this because I haven't seen it myself. Because what's in the rolling notes what we can tell is different between the house leadership position and our primary position is that their, their position doesn't doesn't do anything about state land use yet. So, you know, we were handing people tents and sleeping bags and then it would have been illegal for them to use it on any state lands. Not a lot of details on the joint fiscal committee oversight, meaning how are they going to hold the administration's feet to the fire. Not a lot of details on reworking the request for proposals for if we do continue to use motels, bargaining a better rate. And then where the money is coming from. I can talk a lot about where the money would come from from our proposal because a lot of it. We targeted the capital bill and I served on the institutions and corrections committee, which is all about the capital bill. And here in his signing of the capital bill just today. Brought that into the conversation. He is, I can talk for a long time about what I think the governor did with $60 million of surplus funds, so that we wouldn't use it for this sort of rainy day right emergency. All story short, leadership in the house leadership in the Senate are working towards a solution. We don't know the details of their proposal yet. We have a proposal ready to go. And I think we have support for that proposal. That's the best option is one of those proposals works to keep people housed. If it doesn't. It is not the doomsday scenario that is being portrayed in the in the media if we decide to sustain the veto of the budget. We will have another budget ready to go. And it'll take a few days, but that's option number 2 is to sustain the veto and give them a new budget to work with that includes money for the folks who need housing. Option 3, I suppose would be leadership could just play ball with the administration and bypass us all together. I don't think that's going to happen. That's good. I think all I would say is that we've spent a massive amount of money keeping people sheltered during the pandemic and throwing people out, wait, waste the money because people when the trauma of that eviction is going to be costly on those other social determinants of health and on our neighborhoods as they as crime increases as quality of life decreases. And that we're this close like that we're we're this is one of the biggest building booms in history we have hundreds of units going on the estimates are 100 to 200 people a month from hotels will be placed over the next year. That's half. All we need to do is step it up a little and come in come up with some interim options maybe buy a few hotels instead of renting them make them into shelters and then convert them into buildings. I wrote an op-ed about this that I'm going to include in my front porch form post tomorrow because it's all about housing because it was like a lot. It talks a lot about the numbers of the investments and it has that op-ed that talks about all the things we can be doing and so I think the main thing is we're asking for to guarantee shelter. And for the state to create a just transition from this this program to housing for all. And if Vermont does this right, we could end homelessness as we know it moving forward. I mean we're that close. And so this is a high stakes situation that's what I just wanted to say that, you know, that it's that's where I had oops, that this is not only the financially responsible thing to do it's the socially responsible thing to do and it's the moral thing to do. And I think there's plenty of reason to be optimistic. I think the movement we've seen in leadership over the past week is encouraging. We just don't know the details. Do people have any questions for us. Thank you so much. Thanks. And I would thank the, especially, I mean, everybody expects this from the progressives, right? We're the ones who are going to do this. The 12 Democrats who stood on the floor and said no to that budget and bought leadership and bought their speaker have been facing a lot of pressure from that leadership. So if you have an opportunity to reach out to the folks and thank them. That would be a kind thing to do, I think. At this point. I can, I can, I can maybe put that out to front porch far. And if you really can't wait, you can always go on the state website and look at the roll call for the budget vote. H 494 is was the bill number. I mean, like if you went on your phone now if you don't want to wait, you could find look through all the yeses and those but it sounds like Troy will also follow up. Yeah. But just so the public knows out there, you know, you can look at our roll calls and everything at the legislative websites actually quite detailed. I might have it on my phone. And I do want to say sorry to anyone who's emailed me and asked for something and not heard back I have a system where if you ask I try to respond but if you just say please vote a certain way. I just look at it and I keep going because I get hundreds of emails. So if anyone's been waiting for an email it's always okay to ask again, but I try to be good about if someone asks to at least catch you but I probably missed some so I just want everyone to know. So don't give up try again. And that if you if you didn't get a response it's simply the volume and the prep like the pressure and I'm also a provider working with unhoused people so it's been like hellish what I'm seeing and I'm happy to talk more about that with you to another time. So, oh yes. Other folks. Yeah, thank you very much for your work. And it sounds like it's all going in the right direction. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And this may be back to the city council, rather than the legislators, but when there was conversation about, and this was, this was back with the resolution that had Sarah Russell do the work that she did, I think. But it was about trying to find regional solutions, rather than a city solution. Now I understand that the state is going to put money into this. The state, but has there been any work so that the burden doesn't fall unduly on the city of Burlington, where this really is a bigger, a bigger issue than the city of Burlington. And it's, and is that where this I mean you're, you said something that would represent something like 2000 units in the next year, being created 100 to 200 month. So, is that in Burlington is that the state wide and how many would how many would we get of those that I'd have to do my homework I know that there's hundreds alone with downtown development that'll be available in 2024 I think. So I mean there's, there's a massive housing boom happening right now all over Chittenden County if you drive around you see buildings popping up in towns, just as for the response statewide. It's varying region to region like the city of Burlington and Chittenden County folks have done a great job to mobilize at the last minute it's like very commendable what the city is doing at this point and the region. Other regions, not so much some places have nothing in place others like in the Washington County, or in Barata borough they're like they're also like creating regional so everyone's not going to end up here. There are a lot of people will end up here because we're Chittenden County and and, you know, we attract people from all over the state you go to homeless encampments in Burlington you ask where people come from. They're not from out of state every now and then I meet a trend like a LGBTQI refugee who came here thinking they were safe and then we're kicked out of the hotel or offered a bus ticket back to Texas or something, which is like and they they fled in fear every now and then but most of them come from Barry from from from Franklin from rural areas where there wasn't there was not a place to safely camp so they come to Burlington. So, for what it's worth different regions are doing a different response but it's it's not equal and we may get people because it's failing that being said I want now I spoke about the state state piece I don't know if our city counselor wants to say anything about the local response. You might have to come up to the mic though. Yeah, I'm happy to hear you Brian compliment the city of Burlington on its response and and you know just to expound a little bit on on what Jonathan said and maybe to put a little bit of a sharper point on it. You know, the Burlington has taken a disproportionate share of this burden has, and is, you know, we have in the last few years, the city of Burlington has stood up to low barrier shelters, and is, you know, planning to, if necessary to stand up a third. Elm Elmwood Avenue is it you know runs a cost of, you know about $1.1 million a year. The Champlain Valley in I think is close to that I think it's less than a million dollars. You know I understand that there's federal money, and perhaps some state money there. But you know, those are those are significant policy commitments that embody I think the values of this city. I think the administration, the city council, and Burlington citizens should be rightly proud of, is it enough to address this overwhelming problem. No, clearly not. I was struck though during Sarah Russell's presentation that that at least from from her understanding at the time that that no other municipality in Chittenden County, as at least my knowledge or to her knowledge, come forward and said we're going to stand up a low barrier shelter. And you know I am curious as to whether or not there are some levers, obviously if this is going in the direction, and I to am heartened by what you say, if this is going in this direction and this would be the best possible solution. But you know I am curious as to whether there are any levers that can be pulled in Montpelier to pressure other municipalities be so in Chittenden County, besides Burlington to stand up low barrier shelters and provide some of these services. You know, because, as we all know, we live in the city has limited resources just like, like any other government, and you know that's important to recognize. To put a finer point on it, what can the legislature do to encourage browbeat shame. You know, other municipalities in Chittenden County to do their fair share in response to this humanitarian crisis. So I won't speak to what we can do to shame or anything like that because that's not my style but I think we can incentivize, we can incentivize it maybe through tax breaks for municipalities who choose to be sanctuary communities or whatever welcoming communities whatever we want to designate the name to be, we could offer extra money to places. So definitely this is the kind these are the kinds of solutions we need time like to figure out before we dump people to the streets and then where do they end up. So, we're hoping to buy some time to keep people in those hotels for the state to start reinvesting that money and maybe part of that reinvestment is looking at where the hotels are, instead of moving people trying to buy the hotels. One idea I had was what if in what if these there's some hotels who the area around them have been harmed over time from the crime so the people in the neighborhoods are angry at the hotels there's all this like there's been harm caused by the actions of the state what if the state said we're going to bring the people in the hotels and the people outside of the hotels and the business owners and the landlords together in that neighborhood now and dream of what that neighborhood could be. We dump money into revitalizing that neighborhood public private partnership building housing in that neighborhood, and then the people who live in the hotels just move into that housing because now they're neighbors with the other people because they created a community together. In the wake of this harm, like that we can do that as a state and there are pieces of legislation in place right now that are leading us there but I do think we need to like, it needs to be swifter and there needs to be grants incentives funding focus on these kinds of revitalization efforts, and that might to some of the municipalities outside of Burlington entice people to say okay, there's all this money if we revitalize this neighborhood around the hotel and that could be a place for housing spill. So that's one way I would suggest. That's just one idea I could go on and on because I can keep thinking of ideas. I mean, and we all pay attention over the next, I would say week, if not sooner at whatever proposal comes forward either from the leadership or from the proposal of this group of 17. And what it requires the administration to do because we can, we can legislate that the administration is responsible for spending that money, you know, equitably across the state. So, I don't know if that's in the proposal that's currently being drafted by leadership by the joint fiscal committee or not, but watch for that because I think we have to do a much better job the legislature has to do a much better job of putting those guard rail rails of expectation in place for the administrative. Clearly, they weren't there. We weren't ready. Thank you. I'm going to turn it over to Cheryl for will do 10 minutes on graffiti update, and then. And we'll talk beautification and MPA projects. Hi. So I've prepared a presentation that includes 12 photos and coordinated with Sam. So, I have a little intro and then here's the first one. So, some attribute the start of graffiti with the first cave art drawings. Ancient Greeks and Romans signed public building walls, sometimes including poems. American soldiers in World War two wrote the phrase kill Roy was here. And it was accompanied by a sketch of a man peeking over a ledge as a way to encourage soldiers coming along the same route after them. And then in 1949. The invention of the aerosol spray paint in cans made it affordable. And now I'm going to take you into Burlington 2023. This first photo is the backside of Memorial Auditorium. And this what's called basic graffiti tagging. So it's your signature or it could be a nickname that you use. And you can see that there's some tagging that's been done over other tagging there. There it is. Okay. Next one. I've all seen this one. And can we zoom in at all Sam or is that not quite possible. Okay, that's fine. Thanks. Yeah, great, great. So can you go over to so we can see matter. The word matter. Okay. This is what I would call a little bit of respectful tagging. You can see on the T someone has tagged right there and then a little bit on the top of the flower on the end. But it's, it's clear that there is some respect for this mural. Maybe this is a way of wanting to identify with the message black lives matter. I'm not sure. It's the only mural that I've seen that I know of that's been tagged directly like that. And then we're going to go up high. And this graffiti art photo was taken outside the main entrance of city market downtown. And if you look up on the far left. Yep, right about there. You can see the word mother. That's been written in brick and paint combination. So a friend said, as we were looking at it together, just before I took the photo, you know, this is really interesting to look at. And so the more formal graffiti art tagging here compared to what we see at the street level. If we back off now a little bit. Yeah, so you see that tagging that's happening there at the street level around the parking area. And that's back to just the, you know, just the name tagging itself. Okay, with not much else involved. You can see too. That there are fences being put up. Maybe you've noticed that this is the building I was asking you and Tim reported that he knew about some developer who's working to move this into housing. But this is the old YMCA building from the back. It's the one on union and college. And it's been deserted for quite a long time. And also. You can see that the fire escapes. I don't know. I mean, I would love to camp out and just observe what happens when that painting is done how people are getting there. How they stay alive. Okay. And then the next one. So, um, There it is in big bold letters on this. Beautiful mural. Rest in paint. And up. You'll also see over on the side. It. It says in memory of Mike. And then up in the top right is the signature of the group of graffiti artists known as above the radar. Has anybody heard of them before. Yeah, interesting. Okay. What? It's my son and love it runs that. Wow. Every year. Beautiful. They bring artists from all over. Yeah, yeah. Exactly. So I'm going to, I'm going to talk about that too. So, um, this huge mural. We'll see a little more of it was commissioned. By the Lake Champlain transportation company. And it is by the ferry dock. But you only see it if you walk down toward the lake and then turn back because this mural wall actually faces. The lake itself. And so here are a couple more slides of it. So continuing along the wall, there's another mix of signatures and then a figure. Against the orange there. A lot of brilliant colors. It's. And, you know, when the light changes on it, pretty interesting. Okay. And then. The third one from this mural is the end of the building. And if we could. Again, more artful tagging, but if we could get into the. Enlarging the right hand half. A couple of things I want to say. Okay. So, um, First of all, take a look at the giraffes. So I stood there just in all kind of. So those giraffes are painted on. The wall surface itself. And then there's a couple of indents and a little over, not an overhang, but it dense and up there. So. The giraffes were painted. I don't know which end they started at, but you know, they, they move all along that I would have loved to been there to see that. You see, you see the giraffes. Oh, I'm sorry. Of course, there's zebras. Oh my goodness. Of course there's zebras. And you know what it says, it does say zebra in my note. I just should pay attention. Okay. And there are a couple more messages in this. So right, you see that cross. There's a wooden pole that's there next to the kind of little fanged creature in blue. There are two quotes. And the first one says, tell your friends you love them. And below that the second one says, time does not heal all moons. And then on the right is the painted on poster of this group called. Above the radar. And up at the top, it says, and hill bros. And then the second line says, burning them daily. Okay. So anyway, it continues on and goes a little bit around a corner. I think you'd enjoy going to see it. So. Okay, next slide. We're going to go down to Main Street. Okay. And can we zoom in a little? Yeah. So this is right next door to Nectar's. And the word is that Nectar's did indeed work with these mural artists too. Which I would say are graffiti artists. So what I learned is that a group of brilliant artists painted this with under the auspices of. Nectar's. So this first one is a tribute to Andy a dog Williams. You may know he was a beloved DJ and musician and he passed away at age 38 and 2013. And then if we go to the next slide. And down in the corner in pink, it says, thank you a dog for paving the way. And that energy is coming from this figure. And then we're going to go across the street and that alley. And here's the horse. And one more moving forward. So this is what you see at the edge of the alley is you're walking down Main Street, if you choose to walk in, if you're walking down toward. Memorial auditorium, for example. And. It's the signed peace sign. Right. So Kyle Holbrook has written his name up there. It's very easy to read. And then it says peace in quotes. And then stop guns exclamation point 2021. And then what was so interesting to me too, is that if you look. At the wall to the right of that, that's not really part of the mural. Although it is painted red. There's a lot of tagging. So my hunch is that after the mural was made. That respectful tagging happened on the end of it as a way of kind of confirming support for it or whatever. Okay, two more slides. Okay. So here's George Floyd. And. This is at the. On Lakeside Avenue. It's just on the wall that's between the turn into hula. And St. John's Club parking lot right there on the right. And every time I ride my bike by, I just stop to look and take a moment. I think it's been there for nearly three years. It's an example of. Very simple lines. Really convey a tribute message. And then right next to that. Is this on a breaker box. And I think that's all that I want to say about it. Oh, no, there was one more thing. Sorry. So my hunch about this is that. No one asked permission. To paint George Floyd's image here three times. And. I believe this to be hula group property. And that hula has respected. The importance of the. This mural. So there you have it. I have a few more comments to make. So I'm have been in pursuit. Since the last time we met, which is where this began. Of answering my own question, which was, are there graffiti artists who have created any murals in Burlington. By asking around following leads. And. There are. And so for me, it's been an organic and continues to be an organic process rather than a kind of a mission driven quest. I do not see myself as any prime mover on this. So I'm interested in befriending. Turning to wonder. Making real connections by having hearty conversations with individuals. And being able to be escalating, not criminalizing. And doing a lot less. Us and theming about it. So I talked with the Lake Champlain transportation company CFO. Dale or Ringo. They're the ones that happened to answer the phone that day. And I learned about the local graffiti artist group above the radar. And they organize local artists. And they have the opportunity to create those murals. And. LCTC, the transportation company. Started work with above the radar about five years ago. And every year there is an above the radar event with painting and music. And this year it's going to be during art hop. In September on Flynn Avenue. And they will be painting the April Cornell warehouse. Which is owned by the building is owned by LCTC. So I'd say be there or square, you know, or be square. So it's the weekend of September 8th. I think it will be very lively and it sounds like Karen knows about this. So. I've also learned from a friend that Katie Barrett. Who was a longtime art teacher. Is the person who organized the mini mural paintings that we've seen all over the street level utility boxes in South Burlington. They're now over a hundred of them painted. And people from ages seven to 70 have been painting in this project. And I've also noticed some in Burlington and I. I mean, I don't know who painted them. So quickly. What buildings have no graffiti. So the new Y. And inside there's a mural by Juniper creative that involved a lot of people in the community. City market. And the entrance and the interior murals are by Tara Garot. And Tara is also the muralist who did the mural in our own ward called river dwellers mural. In the old East End neighborhood. Maybe you. Not her. And I've met her a few times, you know, in the past. And on Tara's website, which is called wall tonic. It says, she writes my mission is to bring more color intrigue and meaning to our daily everyday lives with dimension shattering art form, known as mural painting. I love that phrase a dimension shattering art form. So she's at wall tonic dot com and Fletcher free library also has murals painted on metal and they're hung high on the building. No graffiti and the deteriorating building on pine street that one level brick building that's adjacent to the Burlington farmers market. Also really magnificent Juniper creative murals Juniper creative is a mother father grown daughter team of artists maybe you've seen them around there also having mural on the side of Champlain school. Really magnificent work. And I want to mention one last one Mary Lacey, who painted that. This geometric hummingbird from her bucket loader truck, high up on the brick wall facing the parking area that used to be the first Ben and Jerry's that was built in a converted gas station on the corner of St. Paul and college streets. So, Austin, Texas, Caracas, Venezuela, and Mexico City are all embracers of street art. Here we come Burlington. Yes. Anyway, I've learned a lot since last we met and the motivation came from right here. And when the question came up of should we be organizing mutually to paint over the murals, it just raised all kinds of issues for me. And I talked about the culture of the people who I haven't met yet. Maybe you have Karen. But anyway, I am way into this. And I have many more slides and it's not, you know, I feel like I was feel like, I wish I could have had permission from the people who made those paintings or I had a way of letting them know that I'm doing this. If any of them follow NPA meetings, you know, they could see this on channel 17. I think there are definitely some issues and I think there are ways to work with it and I applaud applaud applaud Lake Champlain Transportation Company. Nectars and I'm really feeling like there must be some others out there too who are finding ways of. Supporting this group of artists and really celebrating them. So that's what I have to say. Thank you. I appreciate it. That's a lot of work. I don't know the original. Well, I could only read about because I wasn't around for the original intent of the NPAs but I think it has something to do with what Cheryl's been taking on with the graffiti project of. So I just really appreciate it. But that was really beautiful. So thanks Cheryl. So, I thought it was going to be Cindy Cook, but I don't see Cindy here on. She had family comment. She had family comment. So would anybody from the beautification and working group want to share just like give an update. Sure. And we can chime into. A link that we can share. So Cindy, Carol, Joel, Emily and myself met. I think twice since last meeting to talk about different beautification projects that we can do. And there's definitely a lot that can be done in our ward. But we ended up narrowing it down and we felt that some. Capable projects were, we chose two. One of them is Triangle Park, which is actually where the mural is that you were talking about. Right. It's actually right here is the mural. And for those who don't see me pointing, it's right on right where the painted crosswalk is. Thank you, Sam. So with that mural, just, we felt that it really makes sense to also beautify this park that is maintained by the parks department, but can definitely use a lot of TLC and can hopefully bring people there who can utilize it. And also can hopefully have people of the neighborhood, even transplant some of their own plants and you know there's a lot of people on front porch forum who are like hey I've got a lot of stuff in my garden I need to transplant it so that's kind of one of the things that we were thinking of was to beautify this area with native and drought tolerant plants. And also hopefully provide lighting because especially on that walkway from Chase towards Barrett, there's like a couple little yellow dots. That's like a, it's a pretty dark walkway right there so I think that specifically would need some And then we were also thinking about doing either a paver or a packed gravel walking paths throughout just to make it a lot more inviting for for people to come. But there's also another another project. Yeah, so we talked about a lot of different ideas and we, there was a good deal. Oh thank you there was a good deal of excitement about gardening. And or projects that involve gardening both because we can make something beautiful that like Sam was describing and then also because people can get involved by sharing their plants by doing the actual digging and planting on the day. And then hopefully pretty low maintenance and like drought tolerant native plants going forward but if people wanted to contribute a little bit of maintenance going forward that would be possible to so that's probably what we're excited about with these projects. So, um, chase street is comes off of call Chester if you're heading towards Windows. So this is at the end of chase street when you're going to turn right and then go up Grove or patch and road. So this is off. This is the corner of chase and Barrett. And it's Barrett is the one that turns into Grove and patch and it's like them. There's that back entrance to the chase mill, like a driveway over there. I did not know about it at all until I don't live in that in the East end but I but going there it's like it's a little square or not square triangle, but could be great. And right now it's mostly an ash tree, a bench to beds of day lilies and and grass. Yeah, so it's not it's not very noticeable. Pat, I just think that the fact that you don't know where it is shows how much it needs beautified. Yeah, it's got a raggedy a raggedy bench that you don't dare sit on. But it's this prime location to just kind of sit there and watch all the traffic and watch people and say hello and a lot of dog walkers are up and around that corner and it's all part of this hope pedestrian powered and people powered neighborhood stuff in the old East Yes, and that was another thing that I was going to touch on. I know that a lot of people were talking about traffic enforcement and one of the things with this people powered neighborhood is that yes while having the police department other traffic enforcement can help permanent infrastructure can help more. You have speed bumps and speed chicanes and neck downs in your neighborhood kind of like how is it Henry Street that's like right right over here, which we drive like we took over here. Yeah, that's so wonderful to help slow down traffic and implementing those things and also just bringing more people out and providing things for people to use will then, you know, it's the induce the demand and making. If we make this area safer than more people want to walk around. Another, I mean, unfortunately the traffic on Barrett chase that corner is pretty bad and that's just something that we can't deal with right now, but we can provide a really nice place for people of the neighborhood to come. And there's a lot of people of this area and I know that of a lot of people all over the city walk around this area or they visit chase mill go grab lunch. So this is this can be a really nice area for people to utilize but we also have Sam I think there's another page. We also have another project location that is actually. And these are not competing these are just two projects that people can get involved with and they're really really interested in ideas. Yes, and we actually Carol had spoken with someone who is at the hospital administration building, which this is the corner of East and Calchester, right across from the masala restaurant. And there is a current flagpole right there and we already have permission to do gardening implementation. So this is something that we can just our next steps are to gather kind of like materials and costs and provide that to a list of volunteers who hopefully will get tonight. And then this can be something that if we have all the funding and information that we need this can be like implemented by the end of the month or in July or something. So yes, like Emily said not competing. But this could probably be the closest to implementation to now like in the summer, because the triangle park, we will have to have conversation with the parks department because they do own that parcel, but we do know that from past months, like at Shamanska Park, we have provided, or the community has planted on the parks land. And I think sometimes the community is the one who maintains it. It does as well but I think the park has a good relationship with with this community so I think that they would be willing to allow us to do some implementation on triangle park. And we don't I'm aware of the time I don't know how much time we have allotted but we would love to just people who are interested we would love to collect that somehow today and then if there any thoughts or people who live in that neighborhood or if you know the history of who would want to share anything else. And then did we want to say anything about the sidewalk as well I don't know if we had a picture. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, if you guys have any questions. And then we, I have a notebook if people who are interested in providing some sort of, you know, manual labor or helping out with the planting or helping out with. If anybody here has a particularly green thumb and has ideas for what could go here it's a very sunny location and there, I believe and anybody who's on East Ave can correct me if I'm wrong but there is the community garden and I think there's currently water that's already there. So we could potentially partner or utilize the water that's there to at least start the planting and then they can just hopefully be dropped. Yeah. Okay. Okay, because I wasn't sure if there was one specific to the community garden that's right there. Hi, I'm Sharon, and I'm a community garden person, and I live on East Avenue and bonus for you. And for us, the building itself that's used to be the state lab that's owned by the medical center has an outside faucet. Right next to the parking lot, and that's separate from the water supply that the city provides to the gardens but both of those sources, I'm sure would be accessible but once again if you use the water supply from the gardens, you're going to talk to parks and rec, not the hospital, but if, but the hospital I'm sure that I gave Carol the contact I'm sure there'd be no problem with using the water from that building to water the flowers that you plant. Okay, so I'm positive of that. Thank you. You're welcome. So for folks leave. I just want to say one thing as a gardener that whole this that neck of the woods is completely infested with Bishop weed, which is this totally wicked horrible can't get rid of it plant. And if you have transplants from gardens if they bring Bishop if it's entangled with Bishop weed, it will take over. So just to be really careful of which which are you talking about like the east of called called Chester neck of the woods or just, it's everywhere. If you ever go down to the interval it's totally infested the interval but it's all my neighborhood everywhere around there and I don't live far from that that's. It's everywhere. Yeah. I have my questions. Yes. So, is there some money to help out with the project or your own. Yeah, yeah, great. We got. We did get funding from AARP. We got funding from the UVM. The SDR and contributed to it. And the UVM office of student and community relations. So we piece together. I think it was together, maybe $2,500 $3,000 something like that. So, we. Yeah, in the old East end. Yeah, we did. We, we look for grants. So they're out there and party. You've talked about that several times is, you know, we probably need some resources within this group to start helping out. This group to start helping getting grant money to fund some of these kinds of things. I saw Sophie did you want to go next. I know that in regard to the triangle park VJ, the head arborist said two years ago that he was going to put wildflowers all around the edge at the time that we took down a broken fence. And, and that hasn't happened so definitely the next thing to do is talk to him because he might have it on his plans still to do that. And, and talk to me will I'll talk to Sam about the watering because the watering on the triangle park was a problem. Yeah, we knew that that would kind of be a little, a little challenging, but I think we're hoping that whatever plantings that we can obtain could potentially be drought tolerant. So, maybe would need everybody to bring a pale to the, to the park, just to start them off and then hopefully they'll be okay afterwards. Any other questions comments. So what's going on. Well yeah before folks leave, please, please throw your name down and contact info probably phone an email. Right. Yeah, phone an email as well. We said in the agenda we're going to talk public safety. I almost am inclined to just wrap at nine o'clock because I think part of the discussion we had last time was about with Zariah talking about public safety was wanting to expand and do outreach to bring folks that don't just normally show up to MBAs to have that discussion as well. And I actually do I see a bunch of new faces but we didn't like intentionally sort of do that. So I'm inclined to put that on the sort of bike rack for September's meeting or a future meeting. I'm seeing nods. Look at that we ended on time. Oh, I know. Everybody has a good summer. Make sure to come out to the picnic. Make sure to get involved with the beautification group.