 Welcome to another show of Celebrate Life. My name is Gary DeCarlis and I'm your host. This happens to be a pioneer show, actually. It's the first live show, and it's also the beginning of our third year. For those of you who have never seen Celebrate Life, the idea behind it is to celebrate the lives of Vermonters and other special people while they're very much alive and in our community. I've read too many obituaries, leaving thinking, gosh, I wish I had met that person when they were alive. Well, this show, you're gonna be able to do that. And I'm of the strong belief that everyone has a story to tell. If you're interested in being a guest on our show, please write me at celebratelife0747 at gmail.com. Or if you have a question for our guest, again, write me at celebratelife0747 at gmail.com. Today, I'm honored to have as our special guest, former mayor, Peter Clavel. Welcome, Peter. Gary, very nice to be with you. Good to have you on the show. Thanks for the opportunity. Thank you, more than welcome. So- It's a be here before you have to read my obituary. That's the idea. So you have a lot to celebrate in your life. You know, I was thinking on my way in, Gary, I've had a very good life. It's been full, it's been interesting. I've had occasional challenges, but hopefully I made a positive impact on the lives of others. And if I died today, I could go out saying, I'm happy, it's been a good life. Good, yeah. We're gonna unpack that life a little bit today. Where did it start, Peter? Started right up here on the hill. 74 years ago, I'm born in the Gosbian hospital, second of five kids of a Winooski family. So yeah. Wow. I haven't wandered too far. I actually have, but- And we're going- But I'm back. Yes, you have it, yes. So what was life like early on? You know, I would say that it wasn't always easy. Mm-hmm. You know, I was growing up in Winooski at a time when the city was suffering economically. Yep. And my father and his brother had a small grocery store. Between them, they had 11 kids. So 15 people. A lot of people that- Trying to be fed off a grocery store, like my dad would say, we eat all the profits. He worked very hard when I was about 10 years old. And the grocery store shut down and he entered another life and ultimately got a job at IBM. But he was a hard-working man. At any one time, he would have as many as four jobs. Wow. Yeah. Wow. And you know, and my mom was mostly stay at home. Five kids kept her quite busy. Yep. Yeah. Was the grocery store like a Kaladnese type of grocery store? Not nearly that big. Uh-huh, yep. It was just a small store located on West Allent Street in Winooski, kind of where the city hall is now in Winooski. Yeah. Yeah. They had a good selection of meats. Largely a meat market, but it also was a place where folks, primarily from the Democratic Party, would gather to tell stories, strategize, drink beer, play cards after closing hours. So you were exposed to politics early on. Yes, yes I was. Yeah. Was your father interested in politics himself? He was interested. His claim to fame in terms of public service was serving as the delinquent tax collector Oh my goodness. for the city of Winooski. It was a job which he held for more than 40 years. Wow. That's a dangerous job. Yeah. His brother Bob served on the city council for some time. So yeah, they were definitely politically engaged. And on my mother's side, yeah, there's also was a trend of political engagement. I remember my grandmother telling me that she was a yellow dog Democrat. I said, what does that mean, mom? She says, I would vote for a yellow dog before I vote for a Republican. I said, really? And then I understood that she had six kids and she was widowed. Her husband died when he was 39 years old. So she raised six kids as a single mom and it wasn't always easy. This was before the day when we had a substantial safety net. And so she really appreciated the programs that were brought forth by FDR and later administrations, but those were important to the survival and the well-being of her family. What was, when you think back to those days as a young kid, what was a typical day after school like for you? You know, we had some woods there, not many woods left in Wunoski, but back then there were a lot of woods and ponds and the go brook and we'd wander around there catching frogs, just walking through the woods. Later I would be interested in hunting and fishing and during the summers we'd spend time at a place that's been in the family for 125 years now in Malletts Bay and big chunks of the summer were spent there. Wow, nice. Did you have any, what I want to be when I grow up, ideas? You know, I hesitate to even mention this because it seems so far-fetched now, but at one time I thought I might be a priest. Yeah, okay, that makes sense. Did you go to Catholic school? For high school and for college, but not for elementary school, I went to Wunoski public schools. Then as a very young kid, probably 12 years old, I was elected mayor for the day. No kid, is that right? Wow, there you go, huh. But I always had an interest in geography and current events. What were your grammar school years like? Did you, besides being mayor for a day? You know, it was a good life. Of course, back then we all would walk to school and for lunch break, typically, would sometimes go home but often go to one of my grandmothers. They would both live in Wunoski at the time. And after school, you know, I enjoyed sports. I was never very good at it. Probably, I was best at football, but I enjoyed playing baseball, but I was awful and never could really throw the ball. But a lot of stick ball and a lot of time, just riding the bikes through the streets of Wunoski, yeah. And it sounds like with grandparents, uncles, your own family, that's a huge family network. Right, and also, you know, just the neighborhood was very strong, neighbor-directly adjacent to us at 15 kids. Yep, yep. Imagine. 15 kids. So you go to high school and you went to a Catholic high school. Yes. You know, many of us in Wunoski at the time opted to go to Rice High School. And that was a good experience. I enjoyed my years at Rice, graduate of the class of 1967, and yeah, the good sisters of mercy. There were many late teachers at the time, but the sisters of mercy at the time played a very important role. We always had a tough, but compassionate principle. It was a priest, Spurkey Adams during my day, Father Ross, and yeah. And so that... One of the great traditions at Rice at the time was stunt night, and it continues to this day where each class would, in the fall, would organize a performance. That's right. Was Ron Corey coordinate? Ron Corey was very much the coordinator of the May He Rest In Peace, where he just passed away a couple of weeks ago. I just got a haircut yesterday and I was talking to one of his former colleagues, and we were just telling her about the stunt night days. He would always talk, I used to get my hair cut when I had some of the cut. Now it's mostly polished, but... But he would talk about stunt night as a very special thing for him. He just loved doing that. Yeah, yeah, that's a great memory. Yeah. Oh, that's great. Now, when you went to Rice, you were exposed to a broader section of kids. I mean, from Burlington, from outside of Burlington, did that affect you in any way? I think it affected me because I developed friendships with kids that I might not otherwise have had friendships with. And a number of those friends have passed away. Unfortunately, it's sometimes it's difficult to believe how many of my close high school friends have passed away, but there are many others that I continue to this day to be very, very good friends with. And these are folks from Burlington. So through the high school years, my network of friends grew exponentially. Of course, they would always look at us as the river rats we were called. And I don't know if any of them back then would have believed that this river rat would have crossed the city to become the mayor of the city of Burlington. We'd have often joked about that. Did you get involved in activities in Rice? Things that? You know, when I was at Rice, I was still an altar boy. I participated in CYO for a couple of years. I played football. I was on the hockey team. My wife jokes, Betsy, you were on the hockey team? She said, you can't skate. And she's right. I could not skate. I was on my ankles all the time. You were the goalie? No, but I was kind of the hit man. You know, if there was somebody on the other team that was misbehaving that sent me out to take him out and ended up spending more time in the penalty box than I did on Rice. And then you went to college? And I went to college, you know, I grew up just a few blocks from St. Michael's College. I always liked St. Michael's. For me, it had a sense of comfort and familiarity that I liked, but I didn't wanna go to school in Monoski or Monoski Park. So I decided to apply to a school that was quite similar to St. Michael's in Manchester, New Hampshire, St. Anselm College. Also a Catholic college, but not run by the Edmundites, but by the Benedictines. I also had a cousin who was a Benedictine monk there, so that was a connection. For me, that was a good choice. Yeah, and what did your major in? You know, I went through a couple of majors initially, political science, sociology, but I ended up being an urban studies major, which was a very interesting program. And one of the few colleges at the time that had such a program. And it was kind of a mix of, you know, urban affairs, but there was a track that was focused more on city planning and another one focused on city management. So I had to decide, you know, I really enjoyed the content and the work, but I had to decide, okay, what's for me? Is it city management or city planning? And I decided I liked the city management track, so I applied to graduate school. And this was about the time when many of my friends were getting drafted to go to Vietnam. But fortunately, I was just at the tail end of that process, so I was never drafted. I would have gone if I had been, but I went to grad school, Syracuse University, and received a master's in public administration. And whoever knew that, I'd have the opportunity to use it. My goodness, that's, the progression is beautiful. Well then, to carry the story on, so it was a very intense, Syracuse is a well-known program in public administration, but it was an intense program. You went for a full year, so it was like a 12 month program, but 12 months you're done. Really? So here I am at 23 years old, saying okay, what am I gonna do now? So I started throwing a number of CVs out there. I ended up getting a job in the city of Wunuski at the time it was a model cities program. But simultaneously, I had sent out a few random applications for various jobs, including one for town managers position in Castleton, Vermont. So I went to my surprise, this kid with no experience, 23 years old, I was invited for an interview. I went down there, and before the evening was over, I was offered a job being town manager in Castleton. Wow. 23 years old. Wow. It was a great community. I really enjoyed my time there. I did that for four years. Here's this kid, you know, he was running the highway department, raising, collecting taxes and raising them as well. Overseeing a police department, a fire department. Wow, no kidding. It was a wonderful experience. Did you, anything special that stands out from those years? You know, I learned very early on. You know, I always wanted everybody to like me. And to love me. But you learn in public services, I'm sure you will attest to it if you do the right thing. Not everybody's gonna love you. So I had to cross that hurdle. It's a good lesson to learn. Understand that, you know, you're not always gonna be loved by everybody. Exactly. I also discovered that in public service, you need to put yourself out there. And that wasn't naturally me. I'm sure some people will find it's hard to believe, but I'm, you know, beneath the facade of a politician, I'm kind of shy and introverted guy, and I need to work at putting myself out there. Putting yourself out there, yeah. Huh, yeah. Great grounds to do it in though. Nice little town in Vermont, wow. And then after doing that for about four years, I was encouraged to apply to be the city manager of Monusky, which I did. Wow. And so 1976, now I went to work for the city of Monusky. And that was a challenging job for me. You know, a local boy going home, and Monusky was in a period of great transition at that time. You know, some of the local leaders were fairly conservative and set in their ways, and Monusky was in a period of great change. You know, the urban renewal properties had been demolished and had this large vacant piece of property just off of Main Street. And it was an interesting time. On one hand, we were getting millions of dollars in federal grants per capita of the city was receiving more federal money than originally anybody in the country. But on the other hand, the bread and butter of municipal services, your basic services, they had to be supported by taxes, by property taxes, and some in the community weren't particularly eager to pay their fair share or to increase property taxes. So you had a little, the old school, new school going on, and here you are in the middle. Here I am in the middle. Kind of negotiate both of those. You know, and again, I was still a young guy. You know, I was like 27 years old when I started that job. Wow. Did Burlington serve as anything you can learn from? Well, because it was going through changes. Sure, Burlington was going through changes, but we also at the time recognized that there were many issues that would cross the border between Winooski and Burlington and sometimes would find ways to cooperate. I remember a discussion concerning regional dispatching. Other times there was tension, you know, Burlington at one time wanted to dam up the city above Champlain Mill or dam the river above Champlain Mill and you would have had a dry riverbed. We said, no, no, no, that's not a good idea. Right. And we also had great debates concerning the wood chip plant. Our concern was all this truck traffic going through the city. I never realized it'd be on the other side of the river shortly thereafter looking at these problems from a different perspective. Amazing. Yeah. So then at some point you did jump over the river. At some point, there was a point when I resigned as city manager of Winooski. I had a period where, you know, after being city manager in Winooski, I was a bartender in Winooski. Wow. In Canal Street Cafe. And then. Was that a tough time for you, Peter? It was a tough time because also during this time I was going through a divorce. My first marriage was seven years and it was a tough time. Who am I, you know, in personal life, in relationships, it was difficult. And you're a public figure too, so a lot of that's insinuated. Exactly, exactly. Then I had a brief stint in state government and worked a couple years for an engineering firm where my work was focused on municipalities, supporting municipalities, building infrastructure projects. But then, lo and behold, this guy was elected in Burlington, a guy named Bernie Sanders. Sanders, yes. Bernie Sanders. You know, I was not involved in his initial election, but shortly after he was elected, I met him. And he asked if I would help in certain areas because you'll recall at the time he's mayor, but the Lord of Aldermen did not allow him to form an administration. So a lot of the work was being done by various task force and committees. And I became the very radical idea of controlling costs and Bernie Sanders' idea, we need to do a better job of controlling costs. And he created a cost control committee that came up with some radical notions such as putting insurance contracts out to bid. And then also remembering the early years, I was then living on South Woolwich Street with Betsy and we would build the city's budget around our dining room table. You know, a bunch of us would get together and develop the budget. Amazing. It was like a shadow government in the beginning, wasn't it? In the beginning it was. And one of the, not the first, but one of the first opportunities Bernie had to appoint a department head was when the then personnel director resigned. So he didn't have to remove somebody from office but there was a vacancy that he could fill. And he appointed me to fill that position which was interesting. And so I was personnel director and looking at the overall management of government and one thing that became real clear was they had this mayor with this grand vision for the city and all these ideas but no capacity to implement them. Yeah. So one of the propositions that we began to develop early on in my time with Burlington was to create a community and economic development office that would focus on some of the key issues of facing the city. Chacting investment, creating jobs, making certain that downtown was vibrant, dealing with housing with a particular focus on affordable housing, developing the waterfront, involving citizens and decision-making. So all this became part of the mission of CEDO. Right. And lo and behold, after a nationwide search and this was legitimate, I said I'd rather do this than be personnel director. So I applied for the CEDO position. I was appointed and I did that for about seven years. Wow. And that's when I met you and worked with you being a city councilor. Right. I remember one of our big projects back then was a revitalization of North Street. Exactly. Yeah. Right. So, yeah. That's it. So, wow, that's a lot right there. So all those jobs, Castleton, Winooski, helped build that intellectual capital to be able to pull off CEDO. Yeah. I mean, that's fantastic. Bernie was smart to hire you. Yeah. And that was a great job. And... Great staff you had. We had a great staff. We were bringing in a lot of federal money. We operated for many years without any direct taxpayer support. We kind of lived off what we were able to catch. Yeah. Yeah. You know, you bring in the money and you create some revenue streams and you could grow and prosper. Yep. And we made great progress in terms of revitalizing the waterfront, creating the community boat house. Exactly. You know, the bike path, bringing the department store downtown. Right. Dealing with neighborhood issues. Yeah. Creating neighborhood planning assemblies. What stands out in those years in your leadership role for you? What was the most rewarding part of all that those seven years? Yeah. You know, for me, when I look at my time with the city of Burlington, which was a total of 25 years. Right. You know, seven terms, 15 years as mayor and my time in CEDO is a little less than 25 years. But what was... I think of, okay, my major accomplishments, one is place and that's the waterfront, revitalizing the waterfront. And again, this was both in CEDO but it continued as mayor on that path. In terms of policies, I think the work that we did around affordable housing, creating the land trust and developing policies in the city that would protect the most vulnerable and, you know, we used to preserve the stock of affordable housing. We had produced more, protect the vulnerable and ultimately inclusionary zoning and the housing trust fund. And thirdly, we're just a process and of people being engaged in decision making. I've always said that in Burlington, democracy sometimes looks a little messy. It's because it is. And when people are engaged, yeah. Absolutely. You know, you have to find compromise. You have to reach agreement on some tough issues sometime and in Burlington, local government and politics was not a spectator sport. Everybody was on the field. Yeah. I wonder how many people benefited from that engagement process that actually changed their life in their own careers because of it, you know? Many, many. Many, many. Yeah, I would think. Yeah. Good work. What did you learn from Bernie? You know, so as we've talked, my career prior to joining the administration in Burlington was mostly around management. And what I learned from Bernie is that yeah, management is important, but it can't simply be management. You need to be bold. You need to be introducing and implementing ideas, programs, practices, policies that will make government work for ordinary people. So I learned to blend kind of a radical approach that supported an activist city government with good management. Yes, right. So... Both are important too. Both are important. One without the other. Right, so, you know, I'd like to think that I continue to be a good manager, but also became more out there in terms of advancing new progressive ideas to make government work for all of us. Yes, I think you did a great job here. Oh, thank you. Absolutely. You know, I think many people would say that you could have been a mayor for life if you wanted to be. Yeah. You chose to leave it. Well, 15 years a long time. It is. Sometimes it fell for life. It felt like it was for life. It takes its toll, I'm sure. You remember that even during that period, I wasn't always mayor after serving for two terms to the surprise of many in the community. I think myself included. I lost an election in 1993. That's right. And at that time I said, forget it. I'm done with Burlington. I'm done with politics. I said to my family, we're moving. Need to do something different with my life. So we packed up our bags and without having a job, we moved to the Caribbean island of Grenada. Wow. We lived there for full year. That was the plan, not to move forever but to live somewhere for a full year. The idea of living in the tropics was something that had great appeal to us. It was a wonderful experience. Both for the kids, but for Betsy and I, I mean, living in a society where the white folks constituted maybe two or 3% of the population. You know, I kind of went there to escape politics. I hadn't been there about a couple of weeks and became involved in politics, supporting a guy in a party that was running for office at the time, became very much involved in that. Did some volunteer work in the nonprofit sector. Had my first assignment in international development was from Grenada where I actually, the family stayed behind and I went to work in Gaza Strip for a month on a USAID funded local governance project. So it kind of wet my appetite for international development and world affairs but it also got me in tune with the concept of sustainability is living on an island, you see what's sustainable and what's not. Right. And so after much reflection I decided that, you know, I don't quite have Burlington out of my system and I can't think of anything that I'd rather do than be mayor of the city of Burlington. So I began to think about running for reelection while I was in Grenada and then when we returned it was still a year before the next mayoral election but it began to build a creative platform and build a base of support and ran again in 1995 and was re-elected but one of the key themes that I took into office in 95 was sustainability and I wanted to work to make Burlington. A sustainable community. A sustainable community and it took me a while to get my head around that but it really hit me when I said, you know, it's not all that complicated we just need to make certain that everything that we do every policy that we support, every project that we built makes this a better place for our kids and grandkids other people's kids and grandkids than it is for us. And if we can't push it through that filter then forget it, we shouldn't do it. And I also learned around sustainability that building a sustainable community all four legs need to be strong. It's like a table and the four legs are yes, economic development and environmental protection. We've been talking about that for a long time. Yes, education which also included engagement but the fourth leg which often was the shakiest is equity, you know, how are decisions made? How are resources being shared? How are the marginalized being engaged? And so, you know, on my second time around as mayor, there's a lot of focus on equity. How did you tell me some of the ways you actualize that? Well, again, in terms of decision-making, making certain that all voices were being heard. In terms of housing, making certain that the housing that was being built in the city was not just for folks that had a pocket full of money but that folks with low and moderate incomes could afford a house. And I know that this continues to be a huge challenge in the city of Burlington but it'd be a lot worse if some of the policies were not in place such as inclusionary zoning, such as the condominium conversion ordinance, such as the creation of the Housing Trust Fund. And also in Burlington, some people sometimes forget that, you know, the city worked real hard to make certain that the resources were in place and many of these were federal resources that would make housing affordable to low income people by pegging the rent that they pay to the income that they earn. To this day, I think approximately 25% of all the rental units in the city of Burlington are subsidized and you're paying rent based upon your income. But also dealing with issues such as taxation and putting place alternatives to the property tax, creating a waterfront that was accessible to all. It's a few examples. Yeah, well, that's great. Yeah. So I know you have an amazing wife, Betsy. How has she helped you in all this? She supported me all the way but she's also had her own life as a public education, as a guidance counselor and later as an executive director of a nonprofit organization in Burlington, Mercy Connections. Yeah. But she also, you know, while I was mayor, the one regret that I have is that it takes a lot of time and energy and a lot of that is away from the family. And you know, I would have, if I had to do over again, I'd do a better job of balancing the work-life dynamic. That's a tough one. Yeah, and I try to get home, at least have dinner with the kids but so many nights I'd be off for another meeting or, you know, sometimes I could have said no, I can't go out tonight. And I should have probably said no more often but you're trying to be connected with the community and be visible and accessible. So it's a difficult trade-off and that's where Betsy stepped up and supported me but also... Took care of the family. Took care of the family and, you know, not only our own family but we were for a very short period of time empty nesters and a young boy that I had mentored because as a mayor I was advocating for a mentoring program and, you know, connecting particularly men with young boys particularly that did not have a father figure in their life. And I said, you know, if I'm gonna be out there trying to pitch mentoring as an approach, for those that say, I don't have the time, I don't have the energy, I need to have a mentee. So I had a mentee and the second mentee that I had was a young man who came to Burlington without immediate family. He's from Somalia, raised in a refugee camp in Kenya and, lo and behold, he'd been here for about a year and he needed a place to stay. So we took him in, treated him as our own and he lived with us and we raised him and brought him through those challenging middle and high school days and he graduated from high school, he's doing well now, he's got three kids of his own. No kidding. Does he live in Burlington? He lives in Burlington. He lives in Burlington. Yeah, yeah, so that was great. That's wonderful. But then after being mayor, you know, one of the reasons I left the mayor's office is, you know, as you know, Burlington had its own municipal foreign policy, which oftentimes looked different than our country's foreign policy. We had an array of sister city programs. I had been involved in a nonprofit organization many years on the board of the Institute for Sustainable Communities. And I said, I really want to do this work. And so I left the mayor's office in 2006 and I immediately joined an international development consulting firm that happened to be based in Burlington at the time it was led by a guy named George Burrell. That's right. And so I joined them and I had a very satisfying career with them, which included working in some very fascinating places. Some of the countries. Most of my work was working with local governments or sometimes with central governments that were interested in strengthening local governance. And this was particularly important in the former communist countries, but I've worked in some interesting places. Jordan, Uganda, I visited on a frequent occasion. I spent three, four months once starting off a large project in Afghanistan. Yeah. And then my last major gig was living and working in a fascinating country of Albania for four and a half years. Wow. I was the manager of a project that I like to think was quite successful strengthening local governance in Albania. That's fantastic. I still dabble a little bit in that work. Mostly retired, but on occasion I now participate in developing a proposal or implementing a project. And I'm also very involved in an organization called the VCWA, the Vermont Council on World Affairs. Oh, yeah. Right. And the chair of the board of that organization. So that keeps your finger in there. Keeps my finger in international affairs. Is there anything left that you haven't done that you want to do? You know, there's a big world out there. It is a big world. And I'm very curious to other people, about other people. And I want to continue to grow and develop my understanding of the world's problems and challenges and maybe make a modest contribution. But more than working, I'm interested in traveling. And you know, since retiring from full-time work we spend most of January and February just going to interesting places and escaping Vermont winter. And we've been in South Africa, Seychelles this past year. We spent a couple of months in New Zealand, beautiful country. The Polynesian island of, I used to call it Samoa, but now I know it's Samoa. And also exploring the United States, the Southwest, the civil rights sites in the South, Cajun country. So I'm going to continue to do that. Have Morocco on my horizons for next year. Good for you. Do you do any writing about all of your life experiences? No, I sometimes think that maybe I should, but I haven't done that yet. One of the problems is that I really can't type or process words very quickly. But I might find a way to do that, yeah. How about your kids? How are they doing? Kids are doing great, yeah. And I'm very appreciative of the fact that most of my family, my African son, but my two biological boys, they all live in Burlington. Oh, it's beautiful. Yeah. One son is a very, Luke is a very successful realtor. My son, Will, followed in the old man's footsteps. He works for the city of Burlington and economic development. Wow, no kidding. Yeah, he's doing good work, very good work. And my daughter, Jay, who we adopted when she was, I don't know, four months old. She was born in Korea. She visits quite often, but she lives in Providence, Rhode Island. She's married to a Providence firefighter. Wow. She's a world traveler. I mean, she's constantly traveling. So that spirit of adventure and travel was passed on to the kids. That's great. Yeah. We're getting close to the end of our time together. Any words of wisdom or any quotes or special thoughts that you used in your career that you could pass on to other people? I think it's a, what's the Nike slogan? Just do it. Go for it. Go for it. Don't hesitate. Take risk. Yeah. I mean, that's, if that's one thing, and you can always make an adjustment going forward, but don't hesitate to do something because it's a bit risky. And be yourself and stand up for what you believe in, even though it might not be popular, mainstream. Those are great words, Peter. Absolutely. Any awards that you've gotten over the years that you're especially proud of? You know, being elected mayor of Burlington on seven occasions is... It's pretty special. That's special. I think I'll go down. That is special. But I need to say, it hasn't always been, you know, I haven't always won. As a baseball team, I'd have a pretty good record, but I did lose that one time in Mayor's race, and I ran for governor once and did not do as well as I'd hoped I might in that race in 2004. But it never hesitated, I never looked back and said, oh, that's a crazy thing to do. I mean, it was a bit of a fool's error and running against a one-term incumbent. It's only been defeated once in Vermont history, but no regrets. Good, you put it out there. All right, well, thank you so much, Peter. It's been great having you here. See you, thank you.