 Good evening. I'd like to reconvene this regular meeting of the City Council at 7.15. Would you all please rise and join me in resetting the pledge of allegiance? Thank you, Anne. Um, okay. So that the public doesn't wonder why after sitting here waiting for us to start why we're now going to recess the regular meeting of the City Council, but it's only briefly. So we are now going to recess this regular meeting of the City Council so that we convene, can convene the Liquor Control Commission meeting. Um, and so I will convene that Liquor Control Commission and recognize Commissioner Roof, the Chair of the License Committee. Thank you, President Wright. Um, I will move that we adopt the agenda. Moved by Councillor Roof, seconded by Councillor Mason. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor of the agenda, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? We have the agenda. Councillor Commissioner Roof, item number two. Yes, I move that we adopt the consent agenda taking the actions as indicated. Councillor Roof has moved the consent agenda, seconded by Councillor Pine. Any discussions? Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor of adopting, adopting the consent agenda and taking the actions indicated, please say aye. Thank you very much. We have approved the consent agenda. Item number three, the deliberative agenda, 3.01, Commissioner Roof. Yes, 3-0-1. I'll move approval of a 2019-2020 first-class restaurant bar liquor license application for Fosun at 213 College Street. Contingent upon fire-martial approval with all standard conditions. Moved by Councillor Roof, seconded by Councillor Hanson. Thank you, Councillor Hanson. Any discussion on the motion? President Wright. Councillor Bush, Commissioner Busher. Thank you. I did bring this to the chair of the Local Control Commission attention that the hours of operation for Friday and Saturday night say nine, maybe later. And so that seemed odd and thought that it should be determined. Plus, when you get to the City Council agenda 5.02, there's an indoor entertainment permit for this establishment that says that they're going to have indoor entertainment from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m. which goes beyond the hours of operation. So there's inconsistency. Commissioner Roof. That is correct. So we'll deal with what's in front of us here and we can deal with the the entertainment in a moment. I think we can just kind of strike the maybe later shouldn't be there. That's not a practice that that we have whatsoever. So we can either move it forward with the understanding that it's not maybe later. The time certain is nine or we can make an amendment to represent the the wishes. I look to you for guidance. President Wright. Councillor Bush, you? I would accept the amended language or to remove maybe later so that it is clear that the hours of operation for every day are 11 to 9. Okay. Is that good? Yes. Okay. Any other discussion on this? Hearing none with that language deleted. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed? Passes unanimously. Item number 3.02. Commissioner Roof. 302. I'll move approval of a 2019-2020 outside consumption permit application for Bangkok Bistro in the alley. Look it at 191 College Street. Maximum 22 seats in the alley 11 a.m. to 12 a.m. every day. Moved by Councillor Roof. Seconded by Councillor Tracy. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed? That passes unanimously. Item 3.03. Commissioner Roof. Thank you President Wright. 3.03. I'll move approval of a 2019-2020 outside consumption permit application for El Cortejo located at 189 Bank Street. 10 seats 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. excuse me 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. every day between 519 and 1019. Moved by Councillor Roof. Seconded by Councillor Tracy. Discussion? The motion should be 11 a.m. 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Apologies. 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Any further discussion or questions? Hearing none. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. Item 3.04. Commissioner Roof. Thank you President Wright. 3.03. I'll move approval of a 2019-2020 outside consumption permit application for Restaurant Poco at 55 Main Street with the following conditions. An encumbrance application needs to be submitted to DPW and approved by the City Council License Committee and City Council. Moved by Councillor Roof. Seconded by Councillor Pine. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. Item number 4. Move to adjourn. Move to adjourn by Councillor Roof. Seconded by Councillor Pine. Any discussion? All those in favor please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? We have adjourned the Liquor Control Commission meeting and we will now reconvene we'll actually convene now the City Council with Mayor presiding before going back to the regular City Council meeting. Mr. Mayor. Thank you President Wright. I'll con to order the City Council with Mayor presiding at 7.22 p.m. and welcome motion on the agenda. Move approval of the agenda. Thank you. Seconded by Councillor Busher. Discussion? All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Item number 2 is the Consent Agenda. Welcome motion regarding it President Wright. Move to approve the Consent Agenda and take the actions indicated. Thank you. Is there a second? Seconded by Councillor Paul. Discussion? All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? The Consent Agenda passes unanimously and this brings us to excuse me 3.01 which is an appointment to the Cemetery Commission for term expiring on June 30th 2021. Are there any nominations? Councillor Busher. Yes I'm pleased to nominate Nancy Kirby to the Cemetery Commission. Excellent. Thank you Councillor Busher. Are there any additional nominations? Are there any additional nominations? Okay looks like they're not so we'll close the floor for nominations. Is Nancy Kirby here would she like to address the City Council of Mayor presiding? If she's not we will. Are there any further discussion? Okay we'll go to a vote. All those in favor of appointing Nancy Kirby to the Cemetery Commission please say aye. Aye. Aye. Are there any no votes? Nancy Kirby is appointed unanimously. Congratulations Nancy thank you for your service. 3.02 is a vehicle for hire board for term expiring June 30th 2021. Floor is open for nominations. Councillor Pine. I'd like to place in nomination the name of Bethany Whitaker. Excellent. Are there any additional nominations? Anyone else like to make a nomination? We're going to close the floor for nominations. Councillor Pine would you like to say anything further about the nominee? Just that Ms. Whitaker's career has been devoted to a series of progressively advanced responsibilities around transportation from a consulting perspective to her role is primarily to ensure that our transportation infrastructure is really planned and designed to serve people first in the planet as well but really has I think brings a wealth of experience. We should be grateful to have her. Thank you Councillor Pine. Is Bethany Whitaker here tonight? She'd like to offer any remarks. I will we will go to a vote. All those in favor of the nomination please say aye. Aye. Are there any no votes? Congratulations Bethany on your unanimous appointment and without objection the City Council Mayor presiding is adjourned at 7.25 p.m. Thank you Mr. Mayor and I will now reconvene the regular City Council meeting at 7.25 and we will actually go to item number three which is the public forum which is for a time certain of 7.30 but we can start at five minutes early because we have plenty of people speaking to go past that time. So we'll open the public forum with Chris Hadsall to be followed by Charles Messing and everyone please just be sure to speak closely into the microphone so that everybody in the audience can hear you and the channel 17 can hear you. You have three minutes to speak. When the middle light goes off you're winding down to about a minute and when the red light goes off you need to conclude your remarks. Ms. Hadsall welcome. Thank you. Thank you. I wanted to just briefly welcome all the new commissioners to the curtain. This is your advertising curtain from the 1930s painted by a wonderful woman from New Hampshire named Lucretia Rogers and Lucretia's daughter has come to see this curtain herself. She's 95 years old. So on this curtain we have Lippas which is the only business that's still in business. We have Shepherd and Hamel. Some of you will remember Shepherd and Hamel up in the blimp. That statue obviously never has existed anywhere in Vermont. It's an imaginary street. It's an imaginary statue and it's part of the whole fantasy world of these scenic curtains. At one point this stage had a full set of curtains which are now all gone. I don't have any photographs. I just have pieces of lumber that are up in the catwalk and that's all that's left of them. But this is part of about 200 of these historic painted stage scenery pieces that we have restored as part of Curtains Without Borders. In fact the very last one is next week in Tunbridge and then every last one of them in Vermont will have been restored. So I just wanted to welcome the introduce the new people. Kurt has seen it many times before but I hope you enjoy it. It does get brought down sometimes for New Year's Eve, sometimes for folk festivals but not often because it is fragile and as you can see there's a certain amount of stress on the fabric. But I just wanted to say that this is our curtain. We have one. So that's it. Thank you Ms. Hazel. Appreciate that. Charles Messing is up next to be followed by Gene Bergman. Mr. Messing. Welcome. Thank you. Councillor Wright. Nice to see you all. New faces. I am everybody who's happy to see me returned. Thank you. Everybody is sorry to see I've returned. Sorry. But here I am and that's a great curtain. It's wonderful. I'm here because of the free College Street shuttle and most of the people who find it most important to have that shuttle are not here because they go to sleep early or they're pitching a tent somewhere. I mean or they live elsewhere. I mean tourists love the shuttle. Everyone feels that it's very hospitable to have the free shuttle and it's very important to have it bring it bring enough for the whole class. Okay so it is very important and I'm sure that there's some way to work it out. I spoke to GMT someone at GMT and they said it was still in the air. It was still to be decided and I know that it has something to do with all of you making sure to let them know that we need it. We have had it and it's very important to everyone who uses it and it's very important that it be there when poor people need to go to the hospital when people are too tired to walk up from Pine Street with all their groceries when they finally make it in to college from where they are out there on Pine Street. Yes so we have to keep it. I mean we're already closing the park for two years and keeping the free college street shuttle will keep us looking open instead of looking like well this was a bad year to come to this town. It's really important and I hope you all think the same way and I love having this thing and I can watch the numbers count down. That is so great. Like what I did last time played well on TV and TV yes hello everybody out there tell them that we need the free college street shuttle. We need it. We really need it. I use it and all the people in my building who are now in bed they use it. No one can believe that it's being taken away and it shouldn't be. It shouldn't be taken away ever. It's wonderful. There you go Mr. Messing and and you know we all are happy to see you. Gene Bergman to be followed by Sandy Wynn. Good evening Mr. Bergman welcome. Evening President Wright and all my fellow former might like well city counselors you know I was a city counselor so I'll try not to use all my time but I'm gonna ask you the council to hold hearings on GMT's proposal to start charging fares for the college street shuttle and to do everything that you possibly can to save the free service. Free service is very important to low-income people going to the hospital. It connects the downtown and the waterfront especially for people who have a hard time getting up and down that steep college street hill and so it's especially important for you to do everything that you can to keep it. You have representatives there. You have the toke. I hope that you hold hearings and do what's necessary. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Bergman. Sandy Wynn to be followed by Ann Taylor. Good evening Ms. Wynn welcome. Good evening sorry no chocolates tonight. Unbelievable. Your time's up. You just can't win can you. So tonight I want to talk about the neighborhood project report that you're going to be reproving tonight. On page 10 there's a quote since 2007 there are 749 more student beds at UVM. I'm sure that's correct. What I'd like to see added to that statement is per UVM data and I have it with me. During that same time period UVM increased its student population by 2,000 students so they got 749 beds and they increased the population 2,000. On page 13 it reports that there are 3100 students living off campus. Please add that per UVM data handed to the city there are 4,007 living off campus. That's 10,300 minus 62,93 if you want the exact number. 900 extra students not reflected in this report is a lot of extra students it's a big deal. How to help the market bring down the value of rental student homes. Please don't provide rehab money. Many lenders already do that. Please don't provide money to buy homes. Don't reward irresponsible landlords. If the city does its job the market will do its job and punish the landlords that should be punished. So what should the city's job be? Pressure UVM to build more housing and make it affordable. Pressure UVM to lift the dry campus status. UVM needs to accept responsibility for its student drinking problems not push it into our neighborhoods. Effect the return on investment ROI drives the problem of homes put it then in the cash flow and you will bring values down. How do you do that? We need a reassessment folks and we need it now. This November a two million dollar multifamily sold it was assessed at one million. That's a big difference. There are lots of other homes with equally that number of different landlords are getting a really nice ride. I grant you that homeowners will also pay a price but the landlords that's a nice giveaway. Get serious about fines for violation and my favorite as you all know is we need to enforce the foreign related not just enforce it but I really would love to have the administration publicly state. We are really going to support this when the administration said that it made a difference. It really did and I can prove it beef up the minimum housing inspections. Let's get some periodic fire safety inspections as well and enforce the lot coverage. You will affect their ROI. Thank you. Thank you Ms. Wynne and Taylor will give us some colorful remarks. I'm sure to be followed by Jonathan Chapel Soka. Ms. Taylor welcome. Thank you. I haven't seen you all for a while. I've been skiing in Utah. It's supposed to be five weeks. It ended up six weeks because I was crashed into by a snowboarder. There is some some relativity to what I'm going to discuss tonight. Okay I didn't know when I should be here to as a physical therapist and someone who is a crash and burn girl who gets injured a lot. When I was chained to the tree on the waterfront four years ago it wasn't just the tree it was me questioning people for two weeks and what I found out is pedestrians are very scared of bicyclists because the bicyclists do not communicate and they go too fast. So pedestrians are like afraid of the bicyclists. So I want to say I'm not into having electrical bicycles all over that bike path. I know we've decided that we would allow segue and I was just told by Ms. Shannon that they're not electrical so good. So anyways let's not let a ton of electrical bicycles because it's it's a narrow pathway and we need all bicycles to have bells like ring ring I'm on your left I'm on your right I'm passing you and in skiing I've been promoting for two decades improved communication called yodel e li hoo that's why the swiss yodel if you're higher up the mountain than somebody down below you it's your responsibility not crash into somebody below you so we need to have speed limits for the bicycles on the bike path and we need to promote communication there has to be I'm passing you on your left there has to be communication and we've lost this in the ski world and it's a good thing I'm a physical therapist and know how to recover from injuries and I am working with win smith of the owner of sugar bush because he happens to be the president of the board of directors of all the ski owners association of the us and we have got to do something in the world of skiing just like the world of bicycling to improve communication and we need to have speed limits for the bicycles and maybe far away there aren't so many pedestrians but maybe the thing to do is to identify where the greatest number of pedestrians are and create speed limits and certainly promote communication I'm on your left I'm on your right yodel e li hoo sing communicate and don't crash into people and may we you counselors work on this issue to keep things safer for everybody thank you miss taylor you did not let me down jonathan chapel soka is up next to be followed by charles winkelman good evening welcome good evening thank you I'm jonathan chapel sokel I'm one of the newer members of the wards one and eight npa steering committee um I want to read to you a resolution that we passed at our april meeting and I think I sent it out to all the council members I'm afraid I got some people late because I I did and um and it's on a subject it's about sidewalk safety and it's a subject that had been discussed at a couple of previous meetings and in april we presented a resolution that was passed by both wards at the april meeting whereas burlington takes pride in being a walkable an accessible city and whereas sidewalks must be safe for residents year-round and whereas weather conditions for the past several years particularly the multiple freeze-thaw cycles we experienced this past winter created and highlighted large numbers of dangerous icy and or flooded and otherwise unnavigable stretches of sidewalk across the city and whereas there are numerous uneven sidewalk sections that are impassable in a wheelchair and present significant trip and fall hazards to all and whereas these poor sidewalk conditions adversely affect the health safety welfare and quality of life of all residents and in particular those with accessibility challenges year-round and whereas the effects of climate change will likely exacerbate these problems in the coming years therefore we request that the city and dpw take immediate steps to address burlington's acute sidewalk safety and accessibility issues citywide rather than postponing work until a given stretch of sidewalk can be fully rebuilt according to the strategic plan thank you thank you mr chap full soka charles winkleman is up next to be followed by brian waters good evening mr winkleman welcome thank you uh in 2013 wane brunette uh was killed by officer george tibow in the new north end uh in 2015 mr tibow was accused of domestic assault um but was kept on the force in 2018 a seven days article uh showed that two witnesses had testimony that directly contradicted officer tibow's statement the council did nothing in response to that the mayor did nothing in response to that the police commission did nothing in response to that chief del pozo did nothing in response to that in 2016 phil grenin was killed by officers in his own home del pozo and the council promised the escalation policies in civilian oversight and yet last week chief del pozo with the support of mayor weinberger said that officer campbell was justified in walking up to douglas killburn a man who moment before had believed his wife had died telling him depending on whose account you believe to either quote get the fuck out of here or to quote shut your fat fucking mouth the officer grabbed killburn and killburn punched him which is against the law that officer then responded by punching killburn multiple times break or sorry punching douglas multiple times yes breaking his john multiple places breaking his eye and fracturing his skull and somehow that behavior was justified killburn died campbell walked out unharmed what will change counselors who will be held responsible for this you are the only ones left to be a check on the mayor and the police chief what changes will we see from you thank you thank you mr winkelman brian waters is up next to be followed by kelly divine good evening mr waters welcome cops lie it's almost an axiom for dealing with the with police matters something to always keep in the back of your head cops lie and when they aren't they're often stretching or distorting the truth or trying to cover something up but i'm not here to talk about the medical examiner's report i'm here to talk about the tragedy and a gruesome act of violence that everyone here is dealing with in one way or another the narrative that we have is the narrative of the police and it leaves a legacy that mr killburn's family will have to deal with for the rest of their lives we're told that mr killburn was killed for being bellicose for creating a disturbance that he was killed for being in the way because i know that cops lie i know that the release of footage will add a new thread to this narrative and i think it will be one that will humanize mr killburn i think it will show a member of this community our community distraught over the physical health of a dear loved one becoming upset hurt and defensive as he was verbally abused by a burlington police officer and i won't belabor mr killburn's health uh because i think it's been belabored too much um but i think the video will show an escalation by a physically fit 29 or 30 year old man and a defenseless mr killburn losing his life in a brutal visceral act of violence that has no place on our streets thank you mr waters kelly divine is up next to be followed by steve goodkind good evening miss divine good evening welcome thank you i'm here to speak to the resolution related to um increasing access to public publicly available bathrooms uh as uh some of the counselors know um we uh had a resolution related to this last year and part of that resolution called on our organization as well as um cito and the church street marketplace to look at possible available solutions for bathrooms make an inventory of publicly available bathrooms and come up with some possible suggestions we did some research on other cities and that document was already submitted to the council so uh you know on behalf of our members we still think that it's really important that we are able to as a community address the need for more publicly available bathrooms in the downtown and waterfront and so uh just offering the help and support of our organization if we can continue to play a role in that i wanted to mention uh in the resolution there was a specific call to take a look at the bathrooms that are on the waterfront and we have a group called the waterfront action group who meets once a month not in the summer but most of the year and they've really have put out a call to try to work with the uh burlington parks and rec department to see if we can especially have some of those public bathrooms open when we have one of those unusually warm days in the shoulder seasons whether people are flocking to north beach or the coming downtown uh you know our lake is one of our favorite places in the city and when it's warm out we all like to be there and so that group has been asking if we can extend the season or maybe have some kind of plan to be able to open up those facilities when those warm days come because it does create a challenge on the waterfront if people don't have facilities to use when they come down to visit burlington so i would encourage the council to vote in favor of this resolution and to help continue the important work on making sure that both our residents community members as well as our visitors have reasonable and available access to public bathrooms one of the other pieces that we looked at was as folks know our organization has been working on some parking related issues and we have looked at some other cities that have effectively used their public parking garages as a way to offer bathroom opportunities and since some of those facilities have electricity and water available that may be a resource we could look at reasonably so thanks thank you miss divine steve goodkind is up next to be followed by steven marshall good evening mr goodkind welcome thank you president right by the way i do think segues are electric could you pull a microphone in closer mr goodkind i couldn't hear that i do believe segues are electric by the way i think earlier they said they weren't anyway i think it's now abundantly clear that the city has no intention of repaying any of the money that taxpayers provided for the construction of burlington telecom the city is on record now with the public utility commission of the state of remand saying they don't believe that any of the money from the sale of bt is taxpayer money and that they have other uses for it hopefully the courts will think differently of this when it gets to them not so well known about the issues with bt is that other money was exchanged around the same time as the sale to shares my letter the city council which you folks have copies of explains that this was the cash assets that burlington telecom had accumulated from its operations it was rate payer money about six point six million dollars and probably about a thousand dollars per customer which sounds rather astounding the fox's garden the hen house with a wink from the city ran bt as so as to maximize its cash assets this included putting a rate increase in at the last minute that was totally unnecessary then as planned they took advantage of the blue water deal the p-core deal and divided up the booty when burlington telecom was liquidated the taxpayers got nothing and the rate payers got screwed how things like this city hall park are allowing cynics to proceed without financing how does this happen in our city i don't know for sure but one big factor it seems to be this administration's blind ambitions that are preventing them from seeing that the public's interests are really being looked after too many optics not enough vision thank you thank you mr good kind steve marshall is up next to be followed by jennifer decker good evening mr marshall good evening where's the cup for the water so i'm sitting here because just this evening um adam mr roof uh told me that the there was a resolution on the table for supporting the opening of bathrooms around the city um i'm a little perplexed because i went on the city agenda and i couldn't find the resolution i wonder just as a first note maybe we could do a better job of making documents available through board docs but that's an aside the important thing i want to talk about is the bathrooms i'd like us to look at this issue in a global perspective public hygiene has been an issue since the beginning of civilization right now in india they are trying to convince people to always use toilets can you imagine what the world is like with excrement all over the place we do a decent job of keeping our city clean but let's remember that the human need to for relief is um universal this is about every person who lives in visits our city and is essential that we if we want to be a progressive forward-looking lively city that we provide bathroom facilities everywhere now the the comments by miss divine were in reference to downtown and waterfront this is of particular interest to the business community i sit here and speak on behalf of the entire city of all of the residents of the city and everyone who visits here that bathrooms are needed in every corner and everywhere in between so that people can have a comfortable walk down the pipe path in the interval or walking down church street when they don't want to go to a restaurant where do you go everything everywhere there needs to be a place to use a facility in the public safety committee and we didn't i apparently this was not put in the resolution but in the public safety committee we we talked about wanting to have all of the bathrooms that are currently available in city parks opened and maintained would like to emphasize the importance of maintenance there was a contemplation of buying some expensive bathroom thing that was going to go in city hall park and i want to draw the lesson out of that it's much much better for the economy for the people if we spend money to hire people than if we spend money to create advanced technology bathrooms if you you could have many many more bathrooms for your money it employs people and you create opportunities for people who perhaps aren't really ready for other kinds of jobs so all around it's a great idea for the city please support the idea the resolution thank you mr marshall jennifer decker is up next to be followed by the final speaker of the public forum tonight karen long good evening miss decker welcome thank you i live in south berlington and i appreciate the opportunity to be able to share my thoughts here i too came to talk about douglas killburn and phil grenin and i also just wanted to mention the name of my friend k borneman who was killed in a high speed chase i don't know if um other folks i know some other names have been mentioned here tonight if other folks would like to say the names of people who've been killed by escalating responses by police in our community douglas killburn could have been my brother or my friend and i would just like to invite everyone to spend the rest of my time if we could in a moment of silence i would just like to thank everyone and just thank those of you especially who ask the tough questions today and those of us who won't let these stories be forgotten thank you thank you miss decker karen long is the final speaker today good evening miss long welcome i came to talk about the neighborhood project which i welcome the efforts um i have not read it thoroughly it's kind of a long i haven't trouble hearing you miss long sorry um i'm here to talk about the neighborhood project which is there going to be speak out after the presentation or do i speak now speak now okay thanks um i did take a walk and go to other meetings um take a walk with a consultant and in my neighborhood in ward one there are a lot of um a lot of homes that have been converted to large groups of adults without adequate parking without storm windows a lot of minimum housing things that are in violation i'm not sure that to me the basic obvious thing has been to enforce our minimum housing and enforce our zoning um that's been a tough thing i've been working since 1997 um trying to get that and right now there's sort of a blow up on willard street with a property that has had a very large party this weekend and i know there's other people pleading um with the council and the city to help them on brooks out brooks i think it's avenue um near the campus also ward one because two owner occupied single family homes um or two owner occupied one was a duplex has recently been purchased by landlords and people are parking on the lawn um i'm not sure why we allow that it's baffles me when i walk downtown and i see all the dirt backyards and side yards and our own city greenbelt is not green because we're allowing people to make a single driveway a double wide driveway um and pack down that soil we know we're ruining our lake we're spending a lot of money on stormwater runoff so there's so many basic common sense things we could do um i'm hoping this report will set a fire underneath everybody and especially the mayor to do something we are pleading for saving our neighborhoods we'd like to stay living in town and i guess you know that's the thing that just really baffles me why we can't get enforcement of basic laws for zoning thank you thank you miss long and that was the final speaker in the public forum tonight so we will close that item thank you everyone for sharing your opinions on the variety of topics tonight item number four is the consent agenda is their emotion councillor busher yes i'll move to adopt the consent agenda and take the actions indicated moved by councillor busher seconded by councillor polino all those in favor of passing the consent agenda and taking the actions indicated please say aye any opposed that passes unanimously and we will move forward onto the deliberative agenda 5.01 is an appointment the defense viewer councillor mason thank you president right i'd like to move the name of gordon dragoon as a nominee for the fence viewer mr dragoon is a young ward five resident who is looking to get involved moved by councillor mason is there a second second councillor shannon is mr dragoon here did you wish to say anything it's up to you you don't have to you don't have to just wanted to offer it to you okay any other nominations any other councillor busher no nomination but i just wanted to thank you because i wish you could you pull that out a little closer certainly i just wanted to thank him for coming forward thank you very much yes let's all we all thank you for that um any other nominations hearing none all those in favor of mr dragoon's nomination as fence viewer please say aye aye any opposed congratulations thank you for sharing your time for the city 5.02 is an indoor entertainment permit application councillor roof thank you president right i'll move 5.02 moved to approve a 2019 2020 indoor entertainment permit application for faux sun with a condition to allow indoor entertainment between 11 a.m. and 11 p.m. every day and also with all standard conditions moved by councillor roof seconded by councillor tracy councillor busher president right thank you um on the local control commission we approved hours of operation from till 9 p.m. so i'm not i don't understand this does that mean the sale of alcohol to 9 p.m. but the business can stay open until 11 p.m. i'm not clear councillor roof yeah so the so the motion here is is matching up the 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. time designation on the other application now this was a mistake that was on this application pushing it till 2 a.m. and so this is a correction councillor busher so i misunderstood you i thought you said till 11 p.m. so it's 11 allow me to repeat and start to interrupt correct to allow indoor entertainment between 11 a.m. and 9 p.m. thank you okay thank you very much thank you councillor busher any other just any further discussion on this item hearing none all those in favor of this please say aye any opposed that passes unanimously and brings us to item number 5.03 that's a communication from representatives from brookfield regarding an update on city place burlington and brookfield representatives good evening welcome thank you for being here and if you could both identify yourselves and please pull the microphones in really close to you so channel 17 picks it up sure absolutely good evening my name is will vogal i'm a senior vice president with brookfield properties development i'm chelsea zealbaum i'm a development manager at brookfield we work with chase martin who is here before you in january and um we represent the burlington town center project so thank you for the opportunity tonight to be here um mayor and i apologize i need you to both pull the microphones in really close how's that i'm gonna touch it to my chin here so i really have the right that's okay that's what we need the right perspective so again thank you appreciate the opportunity to be here um there's really two things i want to focus on tonight one is communication and how important that is to us and how important this forum is to us and also the progress that we've made to date so in january we came before you we said that we were bringing all of our resources to bear on this project and that's a hundred percent what we've done since then um we also said that we would come back to you and keep you apprised and keep keep the city in communication so that communication has taken many forms um we are here every week i think chelsea and i have been here every week since january and much of the time spent with jeff um glassburg the representative from the city working through a whole host of things we spent a lot of time also with stakeholders um our neighbors at redstone and the folks with church street marketplace in berlington art um and fundamentally we are one hundred percent on the ground focused on the day-to-day project and moving it forward but this forum is particularly important to us um and so tonight we want to make sure that we're giving you an update um i do want to say um our goal is to give you as much information as we possibly can however simply because of where we are in the process there are certain boxes that haven't been checked yet certain key milestones um that we haven't reached so i don't know that i can answer every question that you have i can however speak to some significant progress that we're really proud of and pleased with um and that is helping this project move forward toward uh commencement of construction so let me just speak to some of those particular things first of all we have a fully executed term sheet with bank of the ozarks that's the financing vehicle for the project um we have 100 complete construction documents out to bid um art clugo from pc uh is here tonight our construction manager and in the coming weeks we'll be getting more information on those numbers and how the the bids come back to us uvmmc who is an absolutely vital and important part of this project has been a big focus of ours over the past few months um we're now at a point where we fundamentally have addressed all the key um milestones for uvmmc and are working closely with them on refining um documentation so we can get things on that front um fully buttoned up um we also as i mentioned continue to work with jeff um the public private partnership here is a meaningful thing um i come from 30 years of development experience with uh with a focus on public private partnership so we know how important that is to you and how important it is to us uh and we want to make sure that we have all of those pieces working um properly and understanding those numbers as well um so um we also have at brookfield a wide array of um subject matter experts and disciplines and residential and retail and i think chase mentioned to you that we were bringing that expertise to bear um and and we've made significant progress as those groups look at this project and determine all the right things that need to happen and to ensure its success um there are many other examples of our progress um but i think that more than anything um i want to point out that it is a complicated project there are things that we're still working through there are certain key milestones as i mentioned that uh that we need to hit and as we do we'll have more clarity for you on specific timing of things uh going forward um however everything we're doing all of our focus is 100 tied to reaching that milestone and getting this project under construction and i really want to emphasize that um so ultimately for us um the trust that we build with you as a function of being here and sharing information that we know we can share and not not conjecture where we're not sure exactly the timing so um that's that's a key point that i think i want to make this evening um we have been i think on the ground and closely involved in this project over about the last three months and a huge amount of effort has taken place during that time so essentially the key message is we're glad to be here we're looking forward to making this project a reality we need to get through a series of important but normal course milestones and as we do we'll be able to come back to you with more clarity uh on our timing to get the project under construction thank you could you uh could you both repeat your last names i did not hear some of us didn't hear them when to begin your last name is vogal that's v is in victor o e g e l e and my last name is zeagle vam say that again zeagle vam okay thank you all right uh questions from the city council counselor tracy then council busher thank you very much president right um so i appreciate you coming and providing an update um one of the issues that has been in uh that has come up pretty continuously uh since the demolition began and and then stopped has been that of uh public awareness around the project and getting regular updates when we received an update from brook field back in january um i asked i mentioned this exact issue and asked for uh brook field to do better essentially to provide more regular updates to the council to provide more regular updates to the public and to really communicate that information because folks deserve to know what's going on with their downtown uh and to know and to get updates and if there's you know anything to to that they can know i think that they absolutely should uh in the intervening time we really haven't heard much in the way of updates and i think that's problematic and continues to to really raise um a lot of uh questions uh for folks in the public about the project doubts as a result of those questions uh and in other cases anger uh at you folks uh and mr cynics uh and others involved so i really think that this is the an issue that needs to be rectified in terms of regular uh updates and if you are going to provide those updates to do so regularly um and then also with communication i received a call from mr quigley right there in the front row um letting me know that uh asking me for comment on um mr cynics's remarks that the project would start construction on may 6th and i said well that's news to me um and i find it incredibly insulting that i would be promised in a public meeting better answers and then to have to to hear those answers to reported back to me to the meeting or from the media so i'm asking what do you plan to do better what are you willing to commit to tonight to make sure that you have better channels of communication with this council and with the public understood and you raise some some fair um points that i understand can be frustrating for you um i will just tell you that um the process for us has involved digging into a lot of things and uh and focusing on fundamentals like getting the uh the drawings complete and out for bid um focusing on financing you know the typical normal milestones um there has been a tremendous amount of communication although not necessarily in a public forum um and i think that's because we don't want to stand in front of people uh and not be able to give them clarity and specifics so our focus has really been on advancing the fundamentals of the project i can also say however that we're really now just on the threshold of beginning more of those frequent meetings directly engaging with the community with the people that are around us um because the last thing we want is a project where the dirt is flying and the piles are being pounded and people don't know what's happening so um so we get it i understand your comment that's a fair point but we are committed to better communication going forward so i don't feel as though you've answered my question sir i really would like to know specifically what you're going to do to improve your communication with this council and with the public you spoke of generalities and improving communication but nothing specific well again i think we look to the mayor and council president to um to give us guidance on the best timing to come to the council so those aren't our decisions we're really looking for guidance when we come before you and we're sharing where we are with the project so that when we come before you we can tell you something of substance so i can't speak to specifically when we'll be back again we're going to look to the mayor and council president to give us clarity on when we'll come back but i can tell you that all of our effort is toward getting this project under construction so that's as it relates to this body our goal is to communicate with you as frequently and as effectively as we possibly can but we want to make sure we have something to say that has substance so that your questions um you know don't don't uh aren't left without an answer we are beginning and i think uh in the coming weeks you'll see some of the first meetings where we're looking to meet with the community and specifically the people around us and then the rest of the outreach has been very much one on one and frankly a lot of it with myself directly on stakeholders and people that i know are immediately affected by and have interest in the project so it's really happening on many levels and to be honest i don't know how to provide more specificity than that okay thank you councillor tracy councillor busher then councillor mason so thank you um so can you confirm that that things are going to begin in may as the media reported or no i cannot we cannot as i said we um we we've worked against a series of assumptions and i think there were um ideas of timing that were forwarded in this case by our partner um we are at a point where while we've made significant progress until we simply get through some of the key milestones that every development project needs to get through i don't want to give you a specific date i that's okay that's all right i don't need any i don't need you to go further than that yes um so i i understand the prioritization that you went through but i guess what i'm trying to say is that the city council we're elected by the people the residents in burlington and their stakeholders also in this they're really important stakeholders and so i feel that we should be right up there at the top of your list we shouldn't be seventh or eighth or ninth or tenth and so i am concerned about where you where the placement of the city council is sure with with you and and your team so i just that's my observation just listening to you um the other thing is that with a an organization like yours i would wonder wouldn't you have a pr person or a communications person that could in a more timely fashion put out written communications with timely tidbits of information that are important that could come to the council not always requiring your presence certainly i appreciate you being here and would like you to be here on on on some type of schedule but i do believe that that doesn't halt communication communication can come to us in a number of different formats and so for me it would be really important to get that communication the other thing is that i so i sit here and and the faces and the people change that represents the development and i just want to make sure that as you bring in people these experts that you're relying on that they are familiar with vermont with the region which is upper state new york new hampshire vermont and close to canada understand the competition understand the environment they're working in and really appreciate that environment and embrace it because initially when when this project began when you were gathering ideas i felt so connected i felt so connected and i think the community felt connected he's raising his hand to be recognized that that's what's going on but anyways i felt so connected but then there was a a disconnect when the project started and i don't and i feel that disconnect continues and what we're trying to do is come back together to feel connected and to feel supported around this project and around what this will bring to our community so i'm just sharing my opinion with you regarding the process and the communication and i will just say those are all very fair points i am long overdue to be meeting with each of you individually and that time is coming again the focus has been sort of on the nuts and bolts of of the heavy lifting of the key pieces so we have some ground to make up on that side of things give us the opportunity to do so and tonight i i know you came forward with what you felt you could share but i didn't learn really anything from this communication i just want to be oh no no no no no so no and that's not being a criticism but i know that you feel that you know this is all you can share but i feel like i i don't really have anything to share with my constituents thank you i i understand thank you councillor busher i do want to just to be fair to the representatives from brookfield that the mayor and i talked about report a little while back i think it was in march and it was determined that there wasn't a lot of more information to be shared at that point and the mayor did give a report to the city council relatively brief report i do understand the frustration of councillors that mr synex gave some information that appears not to have been accurate in terms of the timeline over promising and under delivering at this point but the mayor did we we did give a brief report from the mayor and said that we would be coming back with a report from brookfield so i want to be fair to you as partners with us that we want to work together to make this project happen thank you um and with that i'll go to councillor mason thank you president right um thank you both for being here my first question sort of goes back to a comment that mr martin made in january although i don't have my notes in front of me there was some concern about you know maybe softness in retail or residential and you know modifications of the project not necessarily in size but just in terms of the makeup i'm curious over the last three months have you completed that work and you know are you prepared to discuss you know any potential changes to the scope of the project from what was initially announced sure it's a great question the answer is the project that is out for bid is the project that you've seen okay it is not we have not changed the nature of the project um in something as uh as large and complex as this is it possible that there wouldn't be refinements down the road potentially but what i can tell you today is what is out for bid is what was approved um and and certainly like any smart developer we're looking at markets and we're looking at trends but right now what we have out for bid is what was approved okay that's helpful uh i think my second question or sort of comment is a little follow-on i appreciate it i'm not gonna ask you for a date but i do think the public is finding a hard time believing that this is happening and i respect you're here and you're spending money i guess without having you commit you know when are the construct when are you expecting to get your construction bids back and when are you going to be in a position where we can finally come together and say shovels going into the ground or again i'm not asking you but i'm saying like is that a month is it six months is it a year you know we're legitimately getting comments about the hole in the ground you know with a public that is skeptical that this project is actually moving forward i respect how much you're doing behind the scenes but that's not visible so the the push for dates are to prove to the public that this is real um so yeah i understand and telling you that i have a term sheet with a lender and uh and that i have um complete drawings out for bid i realize doesn't provide that kind of clarity um but what we don't want to do is to is to to give you conjecture i can just say that nothing has changed in terms of our motivation to get the project under construction we just need to make sure that we check the boxes that we get through you know the closing i have a term sheet on a loan i need to make sure i get through the closing of the loan i need to make sure i understand the details of the gmp and that i can wrap all those things into a ball and i know what it is that i have um it's not it's not a situation in my mind where the horizon goes out as far as you talked about um but our focus is as much on the near term of getting under construction as we can i just don't want to i don't want to stand here because i can't predict with certainty sure and i want to stand here and tell you that that i wasn't a genuine the first time okay so then my only advice which i think you're hearing from multiple is if you can give us that information as it comes along that provides comfort not just to the council but to the public this this is a real project and it is going to happen under so thank you thank you councillor mason i have councillor ruff next to be followed by councillor jane hansen and then palido thank you president right um i'll be quick and i'm going to continue on the the comments from from councillor mason ask actually just ask for a little bit more um also thank you for coming in the in the update forward and twerf um you mentioned you need to go through and check the boxes i think part of the issue that we and others in the community are having is we don't know what those boxes are and i think that we sum that up and saying hey when are you going to get a shovel in the ground assuming then that you've checked all the boxes but i wonder if if i would request that you share with us what those boxes are into the to the degree you mentioned a few you mentioned closing on financing and wrapping up the the GMT but what what is from this point going forward those boxes that need to be checked you don't need to associate timelines with them because i understand that you can't guarantee the certainty on them is that a list that you could provide to us well i can say this clearly the two that i mentioned are the most important and they're important to any project because they translate to financing and cost um as i said before brookfield is a very deep organization and we have um we have come forward in a role as the managing member of this partnership to uh to effectuate as a function of protecting our interest in the project to effectuate this development and get things going we're bringing our teams into the project in fact they've toured um uh they've toured the market recently to councilwoman busher's comment they've toured the the market recently to make sure we understand what's unique about burlington those are some of the kinds of things because again it it does need to come down to how to build the right project for you and for us and for the community and for the patrons here so fundamentally it's those kinds of things there's no um there's no magic to it these are the these are the fundamentals of development um we just don't want to speak ahead of having all that information and as we have it it will inform those answers and will be the first ones to come here and share the timing with you just a continuation so i i think that a lot of people out in the community and maybe many around i'll include myself on this around this table maybe are not professionals and and understand that from a from a basic level what the fundamentals of development are yes and so again i'll ask if is it is it possible for you to provide even in a checklist form or a short narrative what the steps are that you'll be going through something that we could share with our constituents because like councillor busher said i'm not quite sure what to do and go forward with to help help this project along because at least from my stance i want to see this project yeah see it and be successful and i think this could help i think we can provide some clarity for you okay great councillor jane thank you president and welcome to the queen city thank you for being here um and i think the french people they say adam roof my marches are long meaning what i wanted to ask adam roof just ask it what are those checkboxes you know and it's still not clear but i think my comment is we have what we call neighborhood planning assemblies you know where the community come together ask questions you know ask updates from city councillors and all the time i tell people let's focus on the positive which means this is going to happen right i was not here i'm one of the new people here um but i am going back and when i go back still i'm just going to say oh let's stay positive you know what i mean but you did mention that you speak regularly with mr glasberg and i'm pretty sure you speak with a mayor as well do you provide some type of updates to them at least even if it's not the city council absolutely um i'm actually very appreciative of the liaison that mr glasberg represents it allows us to keep him informed and keep the city informed through him of the progress that we're making we have bi-weekly what we call oac which is owner architect contractor meetings and before we start that meeting mr glasberg joins us for one specifically where we talk about the public improvement side of things and you know on that list of of things that you talked about the councilman roof is working through the complexities and the answers on the public private partnership and the and how those funds will be used as effectively as possible so so yes okay so and the boxes and also you used key milestones and i am new here can you remind me when this project was supposed to start not this spring but when are you asking historically when uh just a reminder i i don't know that i know that specifically but but i it was certainly to have started by now um a year ago i i don't actually know um again we we have become a part of this team and our goal is to get integrated into this community and our absolute 100 charges to get this project under construction our focus hasn't been the history it's uh it's to take what we have right now and work with every single person we can to get to the finish line thank you um and lastly is um let's assume it was supposed to start last year and if those checkboxes was not checked then how likely in a number from 0 to 10 how likely are we going to have this project started in this spring so you know if i'm not going to give you specific dates i'm not going to give you a specific numbers 1 to 10 right but um it's not because i don't want to but i can just tell you that um the same message chase delivered in january i'm delivering now and that is one of the largest if not largest development and um owner managers of real estate in the world is focused on getting this project under construction that was not the case a year ago um but that is the situation now and um and i would just ask that you see that for what it is and and understand our focus is no different than what we've been saying all along thank you councillor jang before i go the next councillor i just want to add in so you said that you would be able to get some clarity on some questions that councillor roof asked is there a timeline on that when you would be able to provide us with clarity sure i mean give us a few days to put something together i'm happy to to outline but you're going to see that these are normal course kinds of things that every developer goes through in order to make sure that that the pieces of the puzzle are right and ready for just our construction and you can give us that'll be a written yes response to the whole council yes thank you councillor hanson then paulino then pine and paul councillor hanson hi how's it going thanks for coming in um could you give us updates on the district heating component of this development so i have had some discussion with district heat um it hasn't been the primary focus of a lot of what we've been doing i know there's an initiative i know there was a lot of progress that was made i know as i understand that there's ongoing discussions with respect to the prospect of extending district energy which is what i'm assuming you're asking about right but there are no specifics as it relates to district energy right now in terms of where we are in that process it's just something we have not yet reengaged with but there is dialogue and i have had um discussions with the folks from district energy from from uh i'm not recalling his name right now but that is on our radar all right are you still committed to participating in district heating and being one of the central hubs that makes this possible um the honest answer is uh i don't know that anything has changed since the beginning when those commitments were made but um i know that process has gone through a long process and there are still due diligence that they need to do uh and and we will be committed to be a part of that process um for district energy to make sense for everyone it has to make sense for us as well and and and that involves a process of due diligence and analysis and review and we're engaged in that but i can't answer specifically because to be honest i don't know the status of the of the overall initiative um but i can tell you the commitment we made and what you see in the development agreement is the same nothing has changed would you be able to include an update on this and when you send around the updates in a few days because i don't think so because it's not it's not the current focus of our effort uh it's it's on our radar but i don't know that there's reason for that to be a key part of what we're trying to update council on right now okay well the reason for me is that this is an incredibly incredibly important opportunity to address climate change in our community it's also something that was promised within this project in order to secure votes for the project the votes that enabled the project um in 2017 so it's really important that that commitment is is maintained so that that's why it's important yes again nothing has changed in terms of the commitment um i would ask the question what what are you aware of in terms of the state of the progress of that initiative well if nothing's changed that's what i want to hear i just want to hear that you're still committed to it that's that's what i'm asking that's that's my answer okay thank you councillor hanson um mr mayor do you need to jump in now or is it time late for you to i just in person right thank you i just i i um think um will's comments are our fair it's been there's legislative action going on um right now that is critical to the next step to the district energy system and i think uh a broader update about where the initiative is um you know sometimes soon would be helpful to this conversation i think and and we'd be the administration would be happily to fry that okay councillor we're into the peas councillor palino pine and paul thank you president right so uh just to go back to what councillor busher said about outreach and i think we're at a loss about sort of how to remedy that problem i think uh i would suggest that it would be helpful to us if you had a representative that would come out to our neighborhood planning assembly meetings to give them an update because to them you know they hear it from us but they don't really understand you know they don't understand how uh how big of a partner you are in terms of your your projects the number of projects how committed you are and to hear that from us would be different than hearing it from you um the second piece is that as much as i would like to know about the progress and the details i also would like to know what can we do you know what measures can we do for parking for people that have been taken away as well as surrounding businesses and maybe a further push for something else i know you've taken some steps but that would be something that if the project isn't going to be boots on the ground by june that we could explore again okay understood councillor thank you councillor palino councillor pine thank you mr president um you spoke earlier about i think the key issue that we face is elected officials to represent the public and that is that this is a public private partnership and um so we're the folks on this at this table who represent the public and um if you could going forward think about just for a little bit um standing on standing in our shoes for a minute how the our constituents want to know what's happening and we repeatedly get asked for information and we often don't have a whole lot of information to share so if you sense a little bit of frustration from the council it's because we're expressing what the people are expressing to us and so when i stood at the polls on election day uh for almost all of the 12 hours i heard more about this than almost anything so this was the issue people really want to know about there's concern about it there are people who said i didn't even like the project but now that there's a hole there i want to see something happen and so there's a public benefit to this project many of us believe and we want to make sure that that happens so i just keep that in mind and um what i'd like to know is did you can you really explain the role at this point of don cynics given that you're here tonight and it seems as though we haven't heard from or seen mr cynics in a while um it's really no different than what you heard in january don is our partner uh that hasn't changed um and bookfield has essentially just taken a more active role we're the managing member of the partnership we always have been we're the primary equity contributor to the partnership uh and we've just taken a broader role in in moving the project forward um but he's a valued partner and uh and nothing has changed on that front okay and then the last thing is the um you mentioned the term sheet which i do have enough background to know that a term sheet is just really sort of an offer of a business deal and it's the terms and the conditions of that financing and did you say it was executed or it's just been offered it is an executed term sheet and and i will tell you term sheets don't come easily from banks um they typically go with a deposit that has to be made a good faith deposit um so an executed term sheet is no small thing that's it's a meaningful thing thank you thank you councillor pein councillor paul thank you um and thank you both very much for for taking the time this evening to to be with us i imagine you probably have gathered by the number of us that have spoken this evening that this is a a significant issue and as a few have already said um you know we we get a lot of questions from people and it's it sometimes is difficult for us to give answers when we don't know the answers um i did want to remind you because i you know we we did not see brookfield during the early days of this project um you know we dealt really exclusively with don cynics and so perhaps you're not as aware um of what happened in the beginning um and what many of us at this table did so that you could be here um and that is that many of the people that are sitting in front of you um voted on the development agreement the development agreement wasn't voted on by the administration the the development agreement was voted on by this body and um not only do we approve the development agreement but a good number of the people that are sitting in front of you um put themselves out there and worked very hard to secure the things that you needed in order for you to do this project and of course we did it for reasons of you know because we we believed in the project and we did it because we feel that it's the right thing for burlington we all had different reasons but we but we were there and so we're in this with you um it is a little disconcerting when there's silence um in our impression regardless of the meetings that you have our impression is that you know unless you're here or unless you're communicating with us we don't hear about that and so um that is disheartening to us um despite our enthusiasm for the project which many of us feel um it's disheartening to us and so we it's disheartening to the community because we don't always have the answers that we would like to have um and i'm a i'm a a little surprised when you first started and said that you have been in you the two of you have been here many times i don't know if you're living here but have been here many times since january and here it is almost the beginning of may and we've never we've never seen you so um you know good bad or indifferent we saw a fair amount of don cynics we have not seen a fair amount of you and we would like to see more of you i would like to see more of you i'll just speak for myself um the other thing also is that you know while um the way our government is set up we have an administration and we that has many many employees we have a consultant who's working on this it's not really the responsibility of another elected body to to to decide when this elected body gets to hear from you and so i would ask that um that you be here much more often even if you don't have a lot to update us on i would like it to be a more regular and consistent um exchange so that we we see you um and when we see you the community sees you and i do agree with others should have spoken to the npa's um there another opportunity for you to engage with the community um and i also agree with you that while it is labor intensive to meet with all 12 of us perhaps individually i hope that you'll take i hope that you will do that because we'd like to get to know you um you're our you know we are just to some degree your partner in this yes this is a large degree of private initiative but it is a public initiative in the center of our downtown and everyone in this room cares a great deal about about that project so thank you very much i i don't really have a question question i just hope that you will um heed what i'm saying i i do i do want to say i take that to heart i think that's a very fair comment our focus has been again on nuts and bolts kinds of things um and we didn't we just didn't put enough focus on building that relationship but we understand how important it is i also want to say we don't take for granted what's come before there was a huge heavy lift that was accomplished by our partner and by this body um and it's no small thing that we sit right now in the position that we're in so we don't take that for granted thank you very much i mean we want to ensure your success because your success is to a large degree our success as a community so thank you very much thank you thank you councillor paul and i would just like to add one um when we talked about communication between your representatives of brookfield and us the city um what is the communication between you and your partner don synix in regard to um part of the frustration is that um this misinformation came out that synix don synix said in the press more than one place that the foundation was going to begin to be poured in may or june i heard may and june and now you're saying that's not accurate are you and mr synex on the same page in terms of communication regularly so that one message is coming out for the council in the city the answer is yes we are in communication we're partners there's a ongoing dialogue on many levels um that doesn't mean that the way things get represented sometimes to the press is consistent and we need to do a better job in making sure that it is and my last thing is just to reiterate you are still 100 behind this project absolutely thank you any other questions from the council we do have a lot of other stuff on the agenda all right i appreciate that thank you for being here we will look for more often updates from you and look for the written update to the questions that council roof put forward and again we are our you know eager partners with you because we do know how important this project is and vital to the city of burlington and we want to work together with you to make sure this happens yes thank you thank you item 5.04 is a presentation from sarah reeves general manager of the chitin solid waste district as well as no it's just sarah reeves good evening ladies and gentlemen welcome thank you very much and thank you for your time burlington is my first stop on my annual budget tours so thank you again my name is sarah reeves i'm the executive director for the chitin solid waste district and the chitin solid waste district is a municipality that was created in 1987 by act 78 to implement solid waste mandates legislated by the state of vermont we function much like a regional planning commission or a water district in that we are charged to design regional solutions to the solid waste challenges faced by our member towns the district encompasses all of chitin county we have 18 member towns and we are the largest solid waste district in vermont we serve a population of approximately 156 000 people over 6000 businesses and we are governed by a volunteer board of commissioners our mission is to reduce and manage the solid waste that is generated within chitin county in an environmentally sound efficient effective and economical manner we employ about 50 people in five main departments administration finance compliance outreach and communications and facilities and we either own operate or manage five different types of facilities drop-off centers the environmental depot the rover a materials recovery facility and an organics diversion facility this year the fiscal 20 budget is seeing increases in both revenues and expenses we are proposing that the revenues will be 12 628 865 we're anticipating expenses in the amount of 11 450 520 we will net approximately 331 000 which will be then put to our solid waste management fee rate stabilization fund the first thing that most of the communities want to know is are you going to assess a per capita municipal fee the answer is no we have not done that in our history and we are going to continue to not do that and then the second thing that they want to know is are you going to raise the solid waste management fee which is essentially our tax on trash and the answer again is no we're going to maintain that fee at $27 per ton of trash disposed most of the trash from chitin county is disposed in Coventry but some does go out of state but not too much last calendar year we embarked on a very wide-ranging and and yet focused conversation about three of our main infrastructure pieces the green mountain compost or we are now calling our organics diversion facility our materials recovery facility or our mirf and our drop-off centers so a lot of the conversations that occurred in the calendar year have been carrying through into this budget the first one as I mentioned is the organics diversion facility and we're changing the name of that facility it has been long known as green mountain compost and really that is the brand that we sell our compost under it doesn't really tell the story of what we do so what we do is we manage organics and we are shifting the paradigm there prior to my coming on board the focus was on selling compost our focus is now going to be on managing organics we have come to realize that being in a retail compost sales arena is not the right thing for us to do but we do need to manage organics better so that is where our focus is going to be that is resulting in some significant changes to the budget of that facility we will be seeing decreases in expenses but also in revenues at the same time trying to improve the processes so that is a wildly moving target but we hope that within a few months that we will have a solid path forward we're looking at two current paths and we're looking to get some clarity we're going to be working with a consultant we'll bring that decision to our board of commissioners and by the fall we'll have a good solid direction the other facility that we worked on last year and continue obviously to work on is the materials recovery facility I told you last year that the markets were bad and they are still not great so the big change this year is we are raising the tipping fee or the fee for disposal to 65 dollars a ton we're also raising the fee at the organics diversion facility to 60 dollars a ton at the MRF the pressures still are in the material sales of the materials that we sell we receive approximately 47,000 tons of materials into that facility what is marketable is about 36,000 tons of that 80 percent are either paper or cardboard and guess which markets fell flat on their face it was paper and now cardboard seems to be sliding so we are continuing to experience as is the rest of the world issues with marking that material so there's continues to be a market volatility I think I also mentioned to you last year that we are even in that seeing some opportunity in the challenges and that we do need to recognize that our facility is 20 almost five years old and has seen much better days it is firmly rooted in the 20th century and we are needing to bring it to the 21st and so we are actively looking at locations we spend last year looking at different processes and we'll be bringing more of that information to our board over this next current coming fiscal year and then we will be hopefully moving forward on building a new facility our facility was designed to accept half of what it does so even though the tonnage isn't necessarily going up the volume is increasing dramatically so we are out of space it's very very difficult to function that is not something we can pay for out of our our bank account so that will involve a bond so you'll be hearing much more from me to counselors comment on the last speaker much more from me regarding the future of that facility and bonding as it's coming up and then the last bit of infrastructure that we focused on last year where our drop-off centers and that is going to be ongoing I think that is going to be another one or two years of system strategy to really figure out where we want to be we're realizing some growing pains with our drop-off centers we did have to decommission the Heinzberg drop-off center temporarily while they built their new garage so their garage is completed and we have put money into the budget this year for a new drop-off center at Heinzberg but we also recognize that there are other facilities that need some attention so we're putting some money in there as well I did mention that we had some fee increases that we're looking at some modest fee increases at the drop-off center the Burlington drop-off center fees will be increased by two cents per pound going from 19 cents per pound to 21 cents per pound we will also be implementing a new fee and this one was one that we did not enter into lightly there was a lot of conversation and debate back and forth among staff and with my board we're implementing a new fee on blue bin recyclables but only on folks who are only bringing us the recyclables and nothing else the fees will will increase for others whether they're paying by a bag 25 cents 50 cents or by the two cents per pound but if you're bringing us the customers bringing to our drop-off center trash and recycling or trash and food scraps or trash and recycling and food scraps there is still that one fee if you're bringing to us only recycling right now you pay nothing you're not paying your fair share so we're going to be implementing a two dollar per visit not per ton or per bucket but two dollar per visit for customers who only bring us recycling and that is to reflect be more transparent about the cost of that particular function recycling has never been free but we have wrapped those fees into the costs bundled them together prior to about a year ago we were not able to unbundle those fees it was against the statute so they changed that last year to allow that so we're going to start to recover some of those fees from the folks who had been subsidized by our trash customers those are my very high level overview and I open to questions thank you Ms. Reeves for that presentation how many how many communities has the budget been in front of already you are the first we're the first okay um Councillor Buscher has questions and then Councillor Roof and Councillor Buscher you Councillor Buscher you're first thank you I just wanted to point you to another person you pay attention to your speaking from the microphone I'll handle the rest okay yes sir mr president okay um I wanted to know if the um if the approval of the budget was unanimous I have to think back I don't have my notes with me I believe that it was but I would have to double check the minutes they've not been published yet that that's key for me the other thing is um I always ask for this is not your problem this is internal to the city but I always ask what Burlington's member how they voted and I would that person has now no longer working for the city but and that's unfortunate but anyways do you call if they supported the budget they did they did thank you um so another question is our current contribution I I didn't see that um and what is our new FY 20 contribution I'm confused by what you mean by current contribution as far as what we pay in to support this nothing nothing okay all right and so um I have a couple of other comments um one has to do with um I am concerned about the no longer um making putting into bags green mountain compost um I think that you know the community you know you inherited it from the intervail um you know the history just like most of us do um and I think that you know part of what we think about in this in this community in this region is sustainability and so now I mean every place that I go to sells green mountain compost in bags and so that's one issue that I think is real I understand you don't want to be in retail but then um maybe that wasn't a good decision initially for you to take it and I'm not satisfied with the direction you're going in unless you're partnering with someone else what are you going to do with the rest of the organics um what's happening here I don't understand that and I couldn't really pluck that out from your communication I think that's really key um and then um the last comment that I have to us make is um one thing that you pointed out to me is that although we have recycling and we have composting um uh you still continue to see an increase in the amount of trash that's disposed of and you don't know why and nor do I um one of the things that I think I wish your um that you would look at that solid waste would look at is you eliminated the free stations I don't know if you eliminated them everywhere but I think you did um and I think that a number of items I understand they were a pain to oversee and manage but I do think that some things didn't go into the trash not a huge quantity but some and I think that that's one of the things that I'd like you to reconsider um every time you increase a fee on a only thing like if people only compost then they pay a fee if they only recycle they pay a fee yet what we're trying to do is get people to separate and do all of these three trash recycle compost I think that some of your approaches for me seem to be disincentives so those are my comments thank you so much for coming tonight and providing me with those answers thanks certainly and thank you for your comment is there a right if I sure thank you um so regarding uh the organic subversion facility green mountain compost we absolutely are planning to continue to sell the material through local garden centers but in bulk so they will be available in the communities gardener supply has been a long term partner with us we also want to get them into to throughout the county into other local gardening centers the issue was that in order to continue to try to recover some of these costs we were having to sell the bags further and further and further afield so we were selling into the north shore of Boston we were looking and selling into New York City it just simply didn't make sense we wanted to bring things back local and to me local is we're not at all possible in Chittenden County so we're focusing our efforts on making uh matching the food scraps that are coming in to the amount of leaf and yard you know matching the nitrogen and the carbon um so that we can make continue to make a good quality compost but in a volume that we can manage and that has long been since the start of that facility on Redmond Road has been the issue is that it was um never designed to be able to expand again it's a similar problem to the recycling facility it was designed for half of the food scraps that we're taking in this year we will probably reach nearly 6 000 tons of food scraps at that facility it was designed to manage no more than three so we have to find a way to reduce those costs and still be able to make these products we're still looking to make three products um so we're not going to lose the Green Mountain compost in Chittenden County it will just be in a different form and when talking to our garden center partners they were actually kind of excited about it because they know that they will be able to have that one-on-one relationship with their their either existing customers or new customers in a new way and they may be able to offer them different services so we will be getting this material into the soil in Chittenden County and that is very important and our board made a commitment to that it was just does should our mission be to become a retail outlet and we just determined that it was not so I understand that there is a loss you know feeling for many folks who are used to that product but they will be able to find much of that in some of their local areas and those lists of the garden partners will garden center partners is going to be on our website if it's not already but it will be there but thank you and I do appreciate the concern you're not alone thank you thank you councillor busher okay we need to tighten this up a little bit councillor roof and we've got other councillors in the queue after okay thank you president right I'll be as quick as I can be thank you for the memo and the presentation also thank you for spending a little bit of time on the phone earlier today and during that discussion a few things I helped helped me kind of better understand some important things first one you've already mentioned is that well at no cost to consumers historically recycling is not free and that this this shift which I also read as concerning is justified or the argument is justified in the sense that you are making it more transparent about what those costs are I appreciate that the second is a comment that will lead to a question I learned that burlington is the only member of the district that has or still or uses a scale when at the drop-off location which as you articulated during the phone call incentivizes people to produce essentially less waste because they're paying for the amount that they're bringing as opposed to the visit outright so my question is what are the plans for the future to motivate or incentivize waste reduction throughout the district it's a great question and you're right burlington is unique in that in that function and ideally all of our drop-off centers would have a scale that is truly the best way for everyone who generates ways to know exactly the cost of what they're generating and you know our efforts in waste reduction as an industry and it's not just cswd or vermont have been lacking over the past 15 years and I think because we focus so much on recycling and our focus I've asked my communications team and my education team to really home in on reduction race reduction because that is one of that's the only item in our mission is you're reducing the waste and the managing but really reducing so the ways that we're going to do that is we're going to ramp up and change our communication strategy we're focusing on being more interactive with people we're as far as informing about what you know just snippets and what do you not know tips and techniques on how to reduce the amount of waste that you're producing whether it's food waste reuse we're looking to sponsor more fix it cafes repair cafes you know getting more involved we're already very involved at the school level most people know recycle ronda and getting but more involved with community-based organizations our waste warriors are out there every day you know talking with their neighborhoods and so really focusing them on those efforts to talk more about and offer practical solutions to reduction because I that is truly the key thank you thank you councillor roof councillor pine then mason jang and hansen councillor pine thank you mr president I'd like to yield my time to councillor hanson if I could to speed this up okay councillor pine is out and councillor well no no I mean all right go ahead councillor hanson I you're you're basically go ahead okay can I go is all right you can you take the floor so thank you for coming and thanks for speaking with me earlier today on this I have some serious concern around it and I think given the fact that we have a lot more time you know we have four I think 45 days from last week when when this came out I think it would be important to bring this to the transportation energy utilities committee to drill in a little deeper and I think really aim at what what you just highlighted which is how do we reduce waste because right now it's increasing and I think that the changes in education and communication I definitely support but I also do know that you know money talks and economics talks and the communities that have been successful at reducing waste both vermont and elsewhere have done it largely by going in the opposite direction of what we're talking about which is by shifting the cost burden more so on to trash and less so on to composting and recycling that's been the model that has been most successful and so as we're seeing these increases I'm concerned that we are simultaneously shifting it the other way where we're keeping flat the cost for trash while increasing the cost for those two so I think this is something that is is really worthy of of a deep deeper look and a better understanding of how we are going to reduce waste specifically and you know why haven't we been able to and looking at other models and trying to shape our actions in that direction so therefore I would I would move that we refer this to the transportation energies utilities committee to be able to to dig more into that as it is a very common you know shared goal of you all and of our community council Hansen has moved that this be sent to the Duke committee is there a second to that motion second by councillor Freeman is there discussion on this councillor mason I guess my only question is is there a report back date and is the expectation that the full council if you maybe could put some finite dates on that that would be helpful sure yeah yeah so we meet on the seventh a week from tomorrow and I well I would somewhat I want to hear the you know the head of that committee councillor tracy respond as well but I think it would be reasonable that we could bring something back for the next council meeting but I would also want to get you're in get councillor tracy's input time just you know don't want to speak for the whole committee as well as councillor councillor councillor tracy did you have comments to make on it yeah we just to say that we're still developing the agenda we were asked to have agenda items for the Duke meeting in by May 2nd so we still have a couple days and are still actively soliciting agenda items so we don't have a solid agenda as of yet so we could address this and this still leaves plenty of time for the timeline for you to June 8th is the 45 days which is a Saturday but so the idea would be to come back to the next council meeting after May 7th council tracy that would be my my hope thank you any other discussion or are we prepared to vote on sending this to the Duke committee okay all those in favor of the motion to send us to Duke please say aye any opposed that passes and please let me know if there's any way that I can be of assistance I'm sure there's a lot of detail that you will need to have before your meeting and I'm happy to either come and present um in more detail or present you with something but thank you very much yeah we'll be in touch very shortly thank you very much Ms. Reeves thank you so just point of order or just before Ms. Reeve I think she thinks she's done I just I don't know if I had a comment that whether it's directed to Duke or Ms. Reeves now so I'm just okay proceed Chancellor Mason um thank you um thank you for the presentation I just to sort of echo and I think I want to bring this to Duke's attention Ward 5 may have a unique circumstance I appreciate your understanding the logic behind why there's the you know the proposed $2 fee on the recycling and Ward 5 our recycling pickup is on Monday which unfortunately puts us on five or six holidays over the course of a year where there is no pickup so I in a number of other Ward 5 residents make the great Saturday morning trip again I don't think a $2 fee will be an impediment but I am concerned we are you know those of us are paying already for recycling through our trash haul are now being asked to pay again a second time because we don't have recycling pickup on Monday so I don't have a fix for that and I know it's something I've spoken with Chapman regularly I constituents are frustrated I think that you know because we have the money pickup there's no other day we sort of bear the brunt of that it may push everyone to toters maybe the you know the unintended consequence but again I'm not sure that's something the board was aware of at the time and I don't have a solution other than to say that may not work very well for Ward 5 residents I can't speak for other wards but and because the city picks up recycling it really is a shape in question sorry correct so for what it's worth that's a concern thank you I will recognize Councillor Jang and then I do want to move forward since we have moved this to the two committee and they will be coming back but Councillor Jang will recognize you yes thank you president and this is an opportunity since you're here and I wanted to make one comment and also ask you one question okay thank you for recognizing me president so the comments that I wanted to make is maybe I am the only person here at this table who use your facility every single weekend every Saturday I am there but don't tell your staff who I am just let me be a regular person so I think you know their customer service is excellent I want you to know that they excellent people sometime my garbage is so light you know the the the scale won't even pick it up and just say go you know I mean that's one but I think it will be imperative for the facility to be upgraded a little bit one the road the road I don't know who does it belong to between Pine Street and inside the facility it's so I don't know it something need to happen and I don't know the the permits that you have or the zoning in having at least a hose there when people put their scrub food scrub sometime we want to clean up a little bit you know and I don't know if it's possible to have a water hose there so that we can clean up you know to look into it and now my question is this this is more of a countywide resolution and it will go to many municipalities let's say it comes back here and then it fails right and it passes in the older communities how would you move forward according to our charter I need 10 communities to approve the budget and then if 10 communities approve it is approved if the any community declines approval there's a process in our charter by which you then need to follow and I'm happy to provide that information to the city so that you understand as well the next steps should you decide to disapprove the budget so it's fairly involved but it is doable thank you for being here and for all you do thank you thank you councillor Jang and Ms. Reeves thank you for waiting through some lengthy other other lengthy items tonight we appreciate it thank you for your time thank you item 5.05 is communication from David White interim director and Gillian nanton assistant director of CEDAO regarding the neighborhood project welcome point of information president what information council roof wasn't right would you like uh would you like the motion to begin this conversation or um sure recommended action would you like to make that motion I would be happy to make that motion just so we can get it out of the way I'll move to accept the neighborhood project report and refer to the community the cdnr committee and the reports recommendations for review and prioritize actions and develop a plan and timeline for taking these forward in collaboration with the administration moved by council roof seconded by councillor pine any discussion on the motion we're going to hear from them first yes let's hear from you before we get into that thank you for having us tonight um as you mentioned uh Gillian nanton is here um from the CEDAO office who's been the project manager for this project is a project that uh both the community and economic development office and the planning office have been working on for more than a year um our consultant is here to uh walk through uh the their recommendations which is the report that will be uh referred to the cdnr to ultimately decide and prioritize on what steps um you the city wants to take moving forward so i'll turn it over to Gillian and thank you very much uh david uh thank you very much our president right um you have a detailed memorandum before use i'm not going to walk through that um in much detail but that's a couple of uh markers for context uh to this project it is just one proposal the neighborhood project is one proposal in the housing action plan which was unanimously passed by the city council in october 2015 and which focuses on the availability and affordability of housing and i think while burlingtonians understood the need and the importance for increased housing to house students they argued for a proactive strategy in addition to increasing our student our housing and that's how the neighborhood project was born it's also it was also part of the eagles land in settlement agreement and i have to suggest and say that is truly a partnership uh with uvm with champlain college and with preservation burlington along with the city and some of my colleagues are here are from uvm and champlain our college and the housing action plan suggested that a study be done looking at the how one stabilizes those near campus areas neighborhoods and so it focuses focuses on wards one two six and eight and um based on what the consultant was seeing also looked at our five um kevin the consultant will talk a lot about the processes the inputs which were received a number of methods were used we had um workshops there was an open house there's a survey kevin will talk about that but at the end of the day what we really wanted was potential tools and strategies which will create opportunities for diversity of housing choices which will improve the quality of the housing stock and initiatives which relate and impacted the quality of life um in these neighborhoods the final point i would like to make uh is uh you would see quite a number of the recommendations tied back to the recently updated plan btv the comprehensive um plan burlington's comprehensive plan which was passed by the uh city council last month and i'm particularly thinking here uh of looking at ordinances which deal with accessory dwelling units land use policy changes that would enable more student housing on the institution's campuses and um a citywide approach to or a plan for protecting historic properties and so i'll stop there and turn over to kevin um who will give you some highlights of the work that was conducted by his team uh thank you all and uh i appreciate being here burlington over the course of the last year and a half has kind of turned into a second home for me uh i guess it's probably too late to get the camera to move to the other side so it can get a better profile hopefully this will work um you're gonna have to forward the slide it won't work thank you why don't we keep going and then we're going to go past the next one jillian just talked about what the project goals were there's the map of the areas that we looked at um and so i want to get into what we learned to keep going so the present state of student housing sorry this is hard to read but there's um just i'm going to highlight this for you all uh and for those of you who've been involved in this project for a while i know there are a number of new city council members um there's nothing in this that has not you had not seen before if you've been involved with this um from the beginning it's basically here just to highlight it for the remaining city council members there's about 3100 at undergraduate students who live in the burlington area not all of them live in burlington about 94 percent of them do more or less um and what this bottom slide here uh talks about is kind of where the concentrations of them are that we were able to put together with the help of of the university next slide one thing i want to say is um and since we've since we started this project we've actually worked for a number of other university towns now including tuscaloosa college station and uh athens georgia um for those of you don't know what that is that's the university of alabama that's texas a and m and that is the university of georgia so there's institutions substantially larger than here uh i would say and i can say this in a very strong way that the community and the partnership between both the city and the schools is is one of has some of the best practices that i've seen and so i think you should be applauded for that um one of the things that's very interesting is there's a kind of a there's two things going on is um the first is that the incidence levels in the kind of the core student areas have been falling over time based upon the actual statistics what has started to happen however as based upon some anecdotal evidence and then looking at some other data related to ordinances and and other um violations it also does appear to be spreading uh as the students spread out more next uh one of the issues that we have in the city and this is kind of a really fundamental one which is why you'll see line of sight to the recommendations that we made is this first this top slide here is something that we call propensity to change and what that basically identifies is people who are at the life stage where they're either likely to downsize or they're going to need a different kind of housing because they need uh they need more levels of care if you will and then the unfortunate problem is that they basically border right where kind of the core student area is the other piece that we wanted to talk about is uh that's related to this is this issue around price appreciation and conversion what we found in our study was that the housing the housing in the student areas was not necessarily more expensive but the transactions were taking place much faster and the people could close much faster and they were being priced differently than how you would price a single family home they were basically being priced upon what you could rent or bedroom next the one thing that's also very important to know and this is the um the diff this is one of the key issues which is kind of what we would call bedroom density which is this dark area here which is in the heart of the student area is some of the most is one of the most dense places in the city because of the number of students that live there based upon the number of bedrooms the other dilemma with this is that it also happens to be in one of the key historic districts and I'm not telling you anything you don't know but this comes into play as we talk about what you what do you do about this next slide please the other thing that we found is and this was pretty widespread and it was not only between people in the neighborhoods but it was also with developers which is that there's a number of rules in the city and um rules and requirements that are not clearly understood and those range from everything from the difference between grandfathered in properties versus non-grandfather properties versus the home replace the housing unit replacement requirement which a number of people thought related specifically if you did something to a housing unit you had to replace it one for one and it actually in only impacts if you take a housing unit and convert it to commercial so there was a lot of confusion about what the rules actually really were next so our basically two conclusions is one of them is something that you all know you've lived here um for a very number of years the first one is that there are student areas that have been student areas for a very very long time and the housing reflects that and they are going to be very hard to convert back into owner occupied or to duplexes or any kind of situation like that the other piece is and I think this is really important is that this you can you can control to some degree the spread of student housing um across the city but the reality is that you have to not only build more dedicated supply to student housing but you have to have an ability to intervene in the market and what I mean by that is that's why we wanted to show the propensity of change slide you have a number of these houses that are in this neighborhood where you have people who are at the point in their lives where they're going to downsize or they need to move to some kind of assisted housing and they happen to be right in the hot spot of where the students are and if you don't want them to be converted over somebody else has to step in and try to find a way to buy them and what we're saying is that the focus should be not on and this came up a number of times from the from the from the neighbors which is the issue is one of balance and balance was one of these words that was very hard to describe but the easiest way to think about it is if there were 10 houses on the street and seven of them are still family homes the three generally speaking people were there was not your usual issue it's when it got to 60 40 or 50 50 or maybe even 40 60 that it started becoming an issue so it's really a question of those houses that are on the margin that can flip it that can change the balance of the street next so this is the point it's going to take some time it took a long time to get here it is going to take some time the other thing I would say and I love you all but there is no perfect solution there is no perfect solution and there is no solution that is going to make everybody happy but what I will tell you is that if you don't do anything that is also a decision as well because the market will just continue to do what it has been doing so we ended up creating a this framework which basically has these three pillars so one is continue the the quality of life initiatives and these are some things that can set the stage and those are a lot of continue to build on and deepen the things that you're doing now the other one is to work on containing and slowing down the conversion of single-family homes and we think that has to take two places one is some some kind of ability to intervene in the market through purchasing the homes and the second component of it is is to potentially use the regulatory actions to make it more expensive to actually just convert them over the third bucket is the convert selected student housing to non-student residential and try to maintain affordability and this is going to be the hardest one to do and the goal here is to not turn it over so that landlords that are going to rent to students can improve their properties it's if I wanted to walk in and buy a house that had been cut up into eight or nine different bedrooms that I want to convert it and turn it back into a duplex the right now some of the condition of some of these homes it would that would be virtually impossible to do from an economic perspective but for places where you could do that it's going to require some capital that that would be very hard to get through conventional financing next slide so on the community feedback and we had a lot next so we took a number of guided tours with a number of residents we went through every one of the neighborhoods we even got hailed on in one of the tours we had over 60 interviews we were originally signed up to do 15 but I realized pretty early on that that wasn't going to work so we were willing pretty much to talk to everybody one-on-one that was we did one big open house in this room and then two workshops that had 85 attendees and then we did an online survey that as you can see with the 179 respondents next slide and what you can see here is and what this basically shows you is what people thought about at the big strategy level the big framework concept and what we asked them is were you hot warm cool or cold and what hot meant is we really like the idea cold meant this is a really bad idea and I won't read these but you can basically see that on the quality of life initiatives they weren't they were more on the warm area on the next slide please on the conversions it was a little bit stronger some of them were a little it was hotter but there was also some people that were cool and we can tell you based upon the comments it was the uncertainty around how would it work which is one of the questions that I think you all will have to grapple with is how would it actually work in practice next slide and then the final one is just converting the selected properties and again on the workshop it was very strong on the survey there was a lot of uncertainty and I think one of the big differences there in the workshop we in the workshops we actually it was not done where I stand in front of room give a presentation and then people ask questions there was a series of boards people walked around there was a lot of one-on-one time with people so we could explain things and I think the way the surveys are hard for some situations that are very complicated next slide so then the specific action items and I'm not going to go through these one more what we did is we identified a series of bullets these are a series of bullets that are in there that have a series of action items in the big report every one of these bullet points has is essentially its own page and it has the rationale behind why we're doing it what it might look like and a hard concrete example from some other place that has done it so you guys can go through those reports there's a couple that I want to pull out here just to give you examples of what we mean so some of them are issues around building on the current runner education programs another one is enhancing livability standards which is on the which would be on the regulatory side on the slowdown the conversion and what we mean by that is and there's a concrete example in the report of things like a bedroom to bathroom ratio meaning that if you want to put in a house that used to have one bathroom and it was a three bedroom and suddenly it's now six bedrooms you got to have two bathrooms in the simplest form and there's again examples of that and then the last piece which is and this is the part that needs work and I'll talk about that next which is there needs to be a fund that would be a combination of public private and philanthropic money to potentially play a role here but what I would say is that not only would it play a role in this it has to play a role in the overall housing question in Burlington it can't would not it doesn't make sense to just simply focus it on on these things but you would want it to be able to do and solve some of the problems that are in this in these neighborhoods next and this is what we want to be here the the financing programs are still conceptual again in the report there are examples of them in other places and so that you can look them up and it also includes the url so you can link to it and find it what I want to make clear and I know that this is a very important thing in Burlington not all of these tools will work in every neighborhood and every ward and that is not the intent the intent was to provide a toolkit for you all to pick and choose of how you want to solve the problem because like I said if you don't do anything it's just going to continue and from what I can tell based upon my work here is it has this has been this didn't happen in the last year let me put it that way this has been around for a while and and there's also a number of housing issues in the city and I think it there's an opportunity to combine some tools with some other things to address this issue next and thanks appreciate it all right thank you questions from the city council councillor shayland thank you that's a really helpful presentation and I appreciate all the work that you've done on this as well as the neighbors that have participated for a very long time in the process and I'm wondering I remember when we passed the four unrelated adults or ordinance and I remember at that time seeing houses convert from essentially unsupervised boarding houses to single family homes and I also think that in more recent years I've seen some of them convert back to the kind of boarding houses that they were and I wondered what what you saw on that issue with regards to the effectiveness of of that ordinance and if there is something that we should be doing to to make it more effective or if there are reasons you think that it's not going to be an effective solution so this is a this has come up a lot the what how I would my answer to this would is this it is a it's a difficult rule to enforce for a variety of reasons and one of the unintended consequences of super strict enforcement is an easy way to think about it this way which is if you have eight kids living in one house and you really force it and you don't build supply someplace else you now have to have two houses for those same eight kids so that's the trade-off well but there's there's uh actually it's a little different than that because of the market issues that you have pointed out in your presentation the eight kids are paying a higher rent for that house and making it more appealing for landlords to buy these houses and then to rent them to eight kids and the economics isn't there at four and you uh so it starts to provide more incentive for single family homes I think the economics are still the economics what basically happens and I'm going through this right now with my own son at the university that he goes to as he moves off campus but it's not here just so everybody's clear um otherwise this would be a real problem but the uh the uh the you put basically the overall house of the rent of the price of the house comes down I think the issue here is more the question of being able to have something that can compete for that if you do the regulatory competes as well but then also have the ability to compete for that house because they they're still going to be able to get the rent um and and that that becomes the issue one of them becomes affordability issue for the students the other side of it the other issue becomes the rents just get a little bit higher but the reality is that unless you have the ability to go in and actually try to compete for that house through some kind of mechanism it's a very it's a very good likelihood that that house is going to convert especially given what the demographics are the problem is that it's very hard to beat the demographics of this of these neighborhoods not sure I agree with that but I'll leave it at that and um I would uh also ask I don't know if you heard sandy wins comments at public forum she had a number of suggestions um for the report and I know she's participated in a lot of the the meetings uh were you able to hear I did hear some of those comments and were those things that were you know those specific things were had they been brought up in the meetings and decided the um group decided to go in different direction or uh or are those new thoughts just based on well the pieces that I heard and so please add is one is around the students so their issue is the question is the undergraduates versus the graduate students uh particularly in the graduate medical education residents those things so the number is a little bit bigger but this is the real issue here is the undergraduate students um the other thing I heard was around the and I believe I heard this there was no room in here so I was just sitting right outside um the other piece that I heard her talk about was the don't give the money to the don't do rehab money for landlords who are just going to do over the apartment so we agree with that um and that if you actually read the depth of the report it says it specifically for people who want to convert it back uh and that would be one of the criteria and the other ones I didn't I couldn't really hear okay thank you um would this be an appropriate time to uh make an amendment to the motion that's on the phone yes I would I just ask that uh uh the comments um that sandy wind made which I have here and can submit to the clerk treasurer's office um also be forwarded to the cdnr committee uh and that the cdnr committee review these and consider them for uh inclusion I think we could just have those forwarded okay we'll just have those forwarded to the committee I do want it on record that that I'd like a report on these items thank you thank you councillor shannon other councillors uh actually excuse me I have councillor busher and then Tracy already in the queue and then councillor hanson yes and now we're discussing that motion and we have councillors in the queue councillor busher so um I wanted to thank you because I think what this report does it compiles what we who live here know but it puts it in a document and it and it associates maps with it so it's real so you really see where the the um the neighborhoods that are on the brink of tipping too far in one direction um and never coming back are and so and it has map as the maps and then some tools so thank you for that um in response to uh if I may in response to councillor shannon's question about why foreign related don't work well the ordinance itself has a loophole that was intentional which has functional family and people can qualify as a functional family it was for extended families for people that are new that come from other countries that have multi-generational members or just members that live as a family but you can qualify and there are criteria and so that sometimes is difficult um to then really enforce the foreign related the other thing and david white is here that can speak to foreign related is for a certain size property but if it's a larger property you can add additional people one per 200 square feet or something like that I I don't have the ordinance in front of me so I think there are many parts to the foreign related ordinance that make it challenging for our community but having said that you know I hope to be able to go to the cdnr um meetings um you know once again this is on an agenda that's packed with really important items and this one is I'm glad that you spent the time in our community I'm glad you walked even though it wasn't ward one not with me but with other people I think it was sandy and and maybe Karen that you got hailed on but anyways um and soaked but um but this is really good stuff um I think that for for us I want to start with the neighborhoods that we can save and then I want to try to solve some of the neighborhoods that we feel have gone too far but maybe there is a way with some of the options you presented to yet bring them back somewhat into balance where they're multi-generational and they work for everybody not just for the student population thank you I agree thank you councillor busher councillor tracy and then I have councillor hansen and paul so if any if I missed anybody get in the queue thank you president right and thank you for your presentation when we started this I think it to pick up sort of where councillor busher left off about trying to make the the neighborhoods more accessible for everybody I think that one of the intentions that I went into this with was really trying to see ways that we could create some economic access to the neighborhood so if we do end up converting or getting more different types of folks so not just students in the neighborhoods that those folks aren't just all wealthy folks who are able to invest significant amounts to do that but to really have people across the economic the socioeconomic spectrum be able to have access to these really great neighborhoods that are close to downtown and so with that one of the things that I wonder is if if you looked at or have seen models or examples where cooperative or housing cooperatives have played a role in neighborhood stabilization and if you think that that might be a successful model for not only bring stabilization but also helping to to create some economic accesses cooperatives tend to be a little bit more economical as well as ultimately sustainable in their approach so I'm just wondering your thoughts on that we in the recommendations that refer to both the containing and slowing down as well as the conversion of some of the existing properties we actually talk about that specifically which is if you particularly if there's public money that gets involved that there needs to be a long-term affordability strategy tied to that of which cooperatives housing trust that you already have there's a number of vehicles that you could do that through and I think it has to be part of the discussion absolutely excellent thank you I'd like to just suggest that the CDNR really give that a review when they should they take this up or when they take this up I should say thank you Councillor Tracy Councillor Hanson yeah I would just say thank thank you so much and also really want to thank all the community members some of them in this room who've worked just so so hard on this for so so long and I'm really hopeful that we can get some concrete action out of this and then turn this report into real meaningful action and I think it was a good point that you raised about you know if we spend too long debating the perfect solution we end up stalling action installing meaningful progress which itself has an impact and does worse than the problem I think that's a great point I also appreciated the point about using this opportunity to combine some other tools to to address housing issues and quality of life issues and I want to make folks aware that I'll definitely be be coming forward pretty soon with some some proposals there of that I think we'll kind of couple with with what's going on here in terms of in terms of that and then just the final point that I just wanted to make is just make it clear at least from my perspective that the problem isn't students I think the problem is market forces the problem is certain landlords that are that don't manage properties well that are neglectful both to their tenants and to the actual buildings I think it's it's important that we the conversation doesn't get framed as you know how can we stay away from students or you know view them in a negative light I think you know there's certainly issues to deal with with with certain students for sure and and other renters as well but I think the focus is kind of the market forces and also the the key power players that really shape the the market thanks thank you councillor hanson I have councillor Paul jang and roof and then I think we should be ready to send this to the cdnr committee councillor Paul thank you president right um I believe there was someone here from the university I'm not sure if they still are here yeah they're here right there hiding hiding behind other people um I also wanted to thank the the university preservation Burlington Champlain College I know that they've all been very involved in this and for those of us who live in the areas that are most impacted we have been certainly playing um having a keen eye on the neighborhood project and it's actually been going on for more than a year it's probably closer to two um you know I think one of the first things that's most key in this report is the very first line in the report um we absolutely need um to do as you say which is not just stand by um we need to create a program to stabilize neighborhoods that are heavily impacted by um by student renters um councillor hanson is absolutely right one of the one of the things that we love about being in Burlington is the fact that we have strong institutions and we have students um that's that's part of why we like living here um most students are extremely responsible most landlords are extremely responsible there are some that aren't and uh it's challenging it's challenging when you put uh working people people with families students in the same neighborhood it's just it's just a challenge because they're all they're all working on on on different clocks and uh they have different priorities and um so you know it is it is it is a challenge quality of life issues are a challenge but they are not something that cannot be overcome um the other thing I wanted to mention is that you know there there are two things as I as I've seen it as a city councillor there are there are two challenges with quality of life issues one is that there are um areas where um there are as you said the balance has shifted and there are overwhelmingly students as opposed to students living side by side with um full-time residents that's one issue the other issue are neighborhoods that are overwhelmingly surrounded by on-campus housing that is not something to take lightly um certainly a lot of people love the redstone campus the redstone campus is um as of this morning when I asked joe spidel 2,800 students are living on that campus I didn't ask about Champlain College I don't know I'm gonna take a guess that there's about probably 900 students that are living at Champlain College at or adjacent or nearby the core campus so we're talking a total number of students not including people who live in neighborhoods we're talking thousands of college students that live within blocks of each other um that is that is that can tip the scale for those neighborhoods who are also impacted and um the university um I think there's you had the goal of enhancing quality of life initiatives which you know of course I support and I think it it just requires vigilance and commitment doesn't necessarily require a lot of money but it does require vigilance and commitment but then there's a second goal of slowing down the conversion of single-family homes and that also I don't believe is insurmountable but I do think that the University of Vermont needs to house more of its students and they need to do it in areas that are um undeveloped or underdeveloped and that's in the neighborhood project I hope that that will be a priority um for the city and be a priority for for all of us to work to house for UVM to house more of its students you take hundreds of students even a couple hundred of students out of the neighborhood you are going to put pressure on landlords and you're going to hold them more accountable and they there is it's a supply and demand issue and I I hope that that will be one of the um uh you know one of the goal one of the action items and I hope that that will really be something that the city and the university will work really work hard to do there is there space for it and it can't be in the same spaces where it's been for many many years it has to be in other areas of the city um and I'm a very appreciative of the fact that that goal is highlighted on page 28 of the report I hope that that will be one of the goals that we pursue um significantly thank you thank you councillor paul councillor jang and then councillor roof and then we should be ready to send this to cdnr committee for further work I will be very short but I will start by saying thank you and I think the presentation was engaging thanks thank you and thanks for laughing about that and thank you too for the work you've been doing so now my question is very specific this is called neighborhood and we know uvm is part of our neighborhood Champlain is part of the neighborhood and the approaches here you mentioned many people community work and all of that but you did not mention any of them as to how did you work with them to create this document um as you know burlington is a very high touch community and we got a lot of feedback um and a lot of drafts uh from a number of people when we I think in terms of the timeline actually some of several of the ideas and all honestly actually came from some of the walks um from some of the walks uh that some of the members of the neighborhood had had and said you know it would be great if we had something they could go do this and then after we molded through it became a question of yeah that makes a lot of sense now the question is what does that actually look like in practice um and um uh so so there's a there's a lot of I mean we you know we heard the we heard the comments and like I said I have two college age boys so I kind of get what everybody else is talking about as well uh at the same time what I can also say um is while we we listened intently and we took a lot of their advice and worded things in ways that uh puts things on the agenda the other thing I will say um at the same time is there is also been there's a lot of it's really time to focus on trying to solve it it has been hanging around for a while and it's just it's kind of time and the problem is that the the demogra you know there was one comment about the market forces but the other thing which also kind of marches inextricably ahead and and if the economy slows the market forces will change the other thing is demographic change and that's very real in these neighborhoods and I think that's something that everybody has to think about in terms of how the speed at which you have to move so other than maybe mr speed speed l sorry spider um looks like you did not talk to the leadership of uvm nor a charm plan you did we did okay but now have you looked into the housing agreement between the city and those institutions yes okay thank you that's all I needed to know thank you councillor jane councillor roof and then the mayor will have the last word great um thank you for the report and all your work as someone who's been with this project since the beginning it's exciting to see it here in an office cdnr where I'll continue to be involved that at that level I just want to note two things right first while this report focuses on near campers neighborhoods it absolutely does have an impact on the entire city and we do owe it to all of our constituents across the across the city to make sure that we move on this because the out-of-wack housing market in my neck of the woods does have that ripple effect and is absolutely a contributor to citywide affordability issues secondly without going too deep into it I do just want to rise up a little bit more in this conversation the role in conversation with the university of vermont because they have indicated that they are ready to come and have real conversations about what new development looks like on their campus and I I do think just for transparency and being open I do think the most logical place what's if they have a depth chart which I'm sure they do number one is going to be trinity campus and so while we're thinking about as this moves forward it's that's most likely where the conversation is going to start from my perspective and from my experience and so I just wanted to elevate that conversation so I look forward to the continued conversation and thank you for the report thank you council roof mr mayor thank you president right the administration is very excited this report is finally complete in in the hands of the council people not that many people may remember the roots of this now going back to when the eagles landing as it was then called now 194 st paul street project was mediated one of the out gross of that was this multi-party agreement between champlain college uvm city of berlington preservation berlington to fund this fund this study and and it is exciting that it's finally before us and thank you kevin for the hard work you put in over a long time on this and jillian thank you for what you've done to keep this uh on track and finally get it get it to this point um you know as you all know if you get me talking about housing we can be here for a while i'll try to be constrained and simply say this this yes this problem is a function of market forces but uh what needs to be understood is we shape the market the people at this table our predecessors the city leads local regulations very much define what the market is for housing here in berlington and this problem is in many ways a function of how severely we have restricted housing creation over a long period of time now this is starting to change uh you know we see the commission a report recently that that is promising you know and the it found that uh in the way at least this report uh defined housing creation we saw the creation of 67 new homes in the in the six years leading up uh to 2012 when we started working together on the housing action plan in the seven years since then we've gone from 67 homes departments being created in berlington to nearly 600 being created over the last uh last seven years and that is before some of the major um uh results of cambrian rise and city place berlington and uh others hit and so we could see that number up go uh dramatically and that doesn't even also doesn't include uh one of four st paul street so the production numbers are starting to go up uh but we we have a long way to go our work is not done that is why we are um as i mentioned in the state of the city going to have a housing summit and the date for that uh we will be promoting details on the on that event and that date will be june 11th and we'll have more details of it coming out this week and some of the strategies um that are in this report very much be part of that discussion at the summit thank you president right thank you mr mayor and thank you for that presentation and we will now we have a motion on the floor to accept the neighborhood project report and refer this to cdnr all those in favor of that motion please say aye any opposed passes unanimously thank you very much we now have item 5.06 which is a public hearing regarding the 2019 community development block grant and home proposed allocation slash proposed 29 many hats tonight so tonight we provide you with uh i believe this is a public hearing yes relative to the action plan for our use of federal community development block grant and home funds and and val russell and todd rollings are here from the community economic development office to explain a little bit more about what this is about and i'll let them speak i'm todd rollings i'm the uh acting assistant director for community housing and opportunity program um and i'm actually gonna uh val russell who is currently the acting housing program manager has done um the vast majority of the legwork on this report and plan and i'd like to turn it over to her hello i'm val russell um so we're here tonight for public hearing like david said on the draft 2019 action plan for housing and community development uh comments received on the action plan will be incorporated into the final action plan before submission and cito is also accepting public uh additional public comments through may 10th uh the action plan is required each year by the u.s. department of housing and urban development in order to receive over 1.2 million dollars in HUD funding the action plan combines the funding recommendations of the cdbg advisory board with the goals and objectives of the city's five-year consolidated plan and shows how the cdbg and home funding recommendations correspond with identified needs and action strategies um a draft 2019 action plan has been presented to cdnr uh they have accepted the draft and it is our understanding that one or more cdnr members will sponsor a resolution to approve it um and submit a final action plan at your may 13th meeting so yeah right now we're here to receive comments all right so we now need to open the public hearing close public hearing and you're also looking for comments from the council that would yes should we do that before opening the public hearing i'd suggest the public hearing and then if the council have comments you'd like to offer as well all right so let's open the public hearing is there any member of the public that would like to speak on this anyone in the public going once going twice we will close the public hearing and any questions or comments from the council councillor pine thank you mr president i'll be very quick the uh the way that burlington allocates the community development block grant funds is something that um began when uh burning standards was our mayor and it is a tradition that is not just something that we feel good about but the rest of the country looks at what we do as a method of involving the community in making these decisions and in prioritizing how to spend scarce dollars and says that's a great model so i just want to highlight that and say um you might not agree with everything they do the advisory board but in the end i think the process is inclusive and it brings people in to understand a piece of burlington that they might not otherwise understand and in doing that i think they make a great um they make hard choices but they make it's a great process i think i want to thank the citizens for doing it and i think cito staff deserve to be recognized for overseeing that process thanks thank you councillor pine anything else from the council hearing none thank you very much item 5.07 this is what you've all been waiting for this is it b-city usa councillor busher thank you so i'd like to move to uh wave the reading and adopt the resolution and after a second i'd like the floor back for just seconded by councillor hanson councillor busher thank you um little did i know when i made the comment about pollinators in plan btv that actually unbeknownst to me going on in parks and rec was um a process that had begun to make us a b-city affiliate um so i didn't know that when i made this comment earlier um but um this is really an important step um there are if indeed we adopt this resolution we would join 81 other b-city affiliates um and if you look at the communication that was carefully drafted by parks and rec by uh cindy white and dan cahill and all other people also that collaborated um what would happen is we would create there would be a web page and people could look on the web page to find recommended native plant species um and those would include wildflowers and grasses and vines and shrubs and trees and also a list of local suppliers where you could obtain those also important would be um a whole educational process regarding pest management and and a goal of reducing the use of pesticides not only reduce the use of pesticides but also if indeed you use them to use a pesticide the least toxic and also um an education about when to apply pesticides so that you'd have the least impact on pollinators um i think all of these are really important steps um you know i did speak about the fact that and it's been in the paper and in the news over and over again that the bee population the honey bee population is is dwindling and really without without bees to pollinate there goes our food supply so although some may smile at this this is really serious business and it has to do with the fact that all of all of this is about climate um change and we are living it now um the other thing that will happen and then i'll just make two other comments the other thing that's going to happen is that we will monitor on an annual basis the number of pollinator habitats that we've either created or enhanced and i think that's important also we'll track our progress we'll see if we're making advances um so um and i don't oh i do see the mayor over there um you don't have to come towards the mike but i certainly hope that city hall park will have pollinator friendly plantings not only in flowers but plants and trees and shrubs i'll be looking for those thank you thank you councillor busher there was a rumor that you would be dressed up as a bee coming up soon is that true that is a so there's obviously some truth to that rumor um anyone else wanted to comment on this mr mayor do you have anything you wanted to add no you don't um councillor yes i would just say briefly this is this is critical especially as the impacts of climate change um become more severe that we're really looking out for pollinators which are so critical to the food chain um and also just wanted to acknowledge you know past work that's been done by um former councillors colburn and dean and and busher on this this issue as well but i'm excited to to move this forward thank you councillor hansson councillor pine as the spouse of a beekeeper i would just add there are a um there are plants which get actually the insecticide is is literally applied to the germination of the seeds in stores and then you go to places that won't name any but you know the big stores they sell plants that literally have insecticides in their seeds so when you do that uh those are really harmful to bee populations and a lot of people don't know that when they buy these incredibly robust looking plants in some big stores that they take home and they bring the insecticide with them and those are actually part of the problem that's threatening the bees bees everywhere so just wanted to point that out and hopefully that will be added too so it's not just you applying insecticide it's actually where you get your plants and what plants thank you councillor pine councillor freeman yeah i just want to say i'm very excited about this um action and um i wasn't involved in bringing this forward but i'm just really excited that it's happening i there have been constituents of mine that have reached out to me about um creating a better environment for pollinators and for insects overall um i don't know how many folks know this but i believe the population of insects is um diminishing at like 2.5 percent globally every year it's an indicator of um a six major extinction um so i'm very excited about this um i think it's something that we can kind of take lightly in this moment but it's actually so essential to our ability to live sustainably sustainably and really sort of regenerate you know for for generations to come so this is really exciting and thank you for everyone who's worked on this it's exciting anyone else all right uh all those in favor of passing this resolution please say aye hi any opposed thank you very much congratulations to the sponsors of this i think you created a real buzz around this issue i know it's i know it's important i you know we can still have a sense of humor though okay item number five point i'm losing track here five point oh eight is turn the page resolution update regarding the structure of public works water resources um chapelle Spencer and mega moire so we are not going to need to go through the entire presentation obviously we had that last meeting so if you can just update us on what changes were made thank you very much uh director chapelle Spencer here with assistant director megan moire please use the microphone i mean have it close to you yes indeed thank you we've appreciated the uh april eighth council work session in the april 15th council meeting where we had a chance to detail uh much of this proposal for the reorganization of the water division of public works uh thanks to all of your good comments uh megan has worked tirelessly to incorporate them into a memo that's in your packet and revisions to the resolution in front of you megan will detail a few of those edits yes thanks again and good evening counselors um so we understood that in order to balance your clear commitment to clean water with your uh very understandable growing concern regarding rate affordability um you need more clarity and some firm timelines around what our currently planned work is um regarding reducing the impact of rate increases on income constrained low income low volume users and so to that point after speaking with a number of the counselors we've updated the resolution to include more detail in specifics um specifically uh starting in line 42 we referenced we did find the resolution uh from september 24th that was part of the issuance of the revenue bonds where this issue was first mentioned um and then starting in line 47 we detail that during the fy 20 fiscal year we're going to be looking at three different packages um with regard to the water resources rates we're going to be looking at alternative revenue sources so figuring out if there's other things that we could be charging for um that wouldn't necessarily impact the residential user uh looking at alternative rate structures including progressively priced tiers to protect access to essential water so that initial amount of water that everybody should have access to without necessarily having to make tough choices about not eating or buying medicine and then the third piece is looking at a potential affordability frameworks um and that kind of runs the gamut from discounts for certain qualifying ratepayers potentially water conservation programs if people are using less water then they won't have as high a bill um and also looking at the we've talked with a number of you about the need for potential grants and loans for upgrading upgrading service lines um we also commit to a robust stakeholder process so an initial stakeholder process where we're talking with people about what their concerns are and what their ideas are and then coming back to people at the end of that process or towards the end of that process to share with them a report on the proposed solutions um so those are all through the background and then we resolve or you all resolve to you request that we specifically provide the city council with the results of these these evaluations um as expeditiously as possible so we're gonna it's in our best interest to get this to you as soon as possible it does take time it is a lot of data and there's a lot of analysis and figuring out who's going to be paying what um but we would be bringing this to you no later than March 15th of 2020 uh for consideration well in advance of FY 21 budget conversations so you would have at least two months before we really get into the meat of the budget presentations and that was the the earliest that we could get it to you firm okay open it up to the council questions from the city council councillor busher so um i will be supporting this resolution i did supply a communication which talked more generically about concerns i have with process um and so i won't and i made a lot of those comments at the last meeting so i'm not going to repeat those um and i know there's a sigh of relief from everyone so um but um but i do want to thank the department i was one of the councillors who took who took you up on the ability to meet with you and talk through all of this and um looked for some expanded um language that would better detail what you would be looking at when you looked at at a new rate structure and i really appreciate that new language in there um one of the things that and i know you um the timeline you said you'd do it as soon as you could i i have some concern about waiting until march 15th and i just want to be clear um the council before you is made up of 12 members four of them got elected last time they're the district councillors eight are up for reelection in march now that doesn't mean that you won't have some of the same faces around the table but there's always a chance that you may not and so i would like to think that those council this council who has been immersed in this and trying to work with you on this would have a chance to look at the options and provide some additional insight so i would like to propose an amendment to this saying that rather than online 80 to change march 15th 2020 to january 31st 2020 so move councillor busher has moved what was the line again line line it's line 80 yes councillor busher has proposed an amendment on line 80 to change the march date to january 31st is there a second to that amendment seconded by councillor freeman discussion on the amendment councillor shannon thank you um i'm all for doing it sooner rather than later but uh i know that there are constraints on the staff to delivering that so i'd like to hear um what their thoughts are on that can it be done by that date uh we can certainly start the engagement we talked about a two-step engagement process uh our intent here is to move as quickly as possible we do not at this point feel comfortable that we could guarantee hitting that january 31st date given the leaves of absence we're facing given the procurement that still is underway but has not been completed and some of the robust engagement that you all want that we want to work through the community we do feel like we need that time through march thank you okay mr mayor so i really strongly object to what councillor busher is raising here i think it's not fair to the team here they have engaged for the last two weeks on this issue and come to this substantial discussion around this and it's been asserted again and again that this is the the best schedule that they can commit to making it on the uh the whole premise of the councillor busher's remark i gotta say i disagree with the it is gonna be the next council that is going to be the ones will be making the detailed decisions about uh what kind of new rate structure gets approved for f y 21 and there'll be ample time for that next council to engage this uh on the timeline this is committed to you know you have a small department that is struggling mightily to uphold its responsibilities here and is doing great work and this is unfair micromanaging i hope the council won't go along with it and we'll stick to the resolution that was agreed to and discussed at length coming until tonight thank you mr mayor councillor jane yeah i think the mayor has a very good point um especially councillor busher's amendment the reasoning behind it it's just because of the council composition will change i think if it was something more with substance we could work around it but at the same time the mayor's point to the team and also let's remember we've been moving this until today to me we were just coming and supporting it and i think we all should be happy that we at least have march 15 in there i mean reason why i won't vote for it thank you thank you councillor jane anyone else on the amendment may i speak again councillor councillor busher yes um so i i appreciate the mayor's comments um and um i think that there are there are several things i i stand behind what i said um but i do think that march 15 is after town meeting day okay there are there are i didn't expand but i can the other thing is that that's pretty late for a budget to be formed to be adopted for f y 21 because normally we have got things rolling so i believe that you know although the city council doesn't get involved the mayor and his administration get involved a lot earlier in the budget process so i'm not naive in this and i so i do take issue with the fact that there is um is a suggestion that that that there it's not self-serving it is somewhat because i do feel that this council has been involved and and would like to to has asked for this rate this tiered rate um proposal so i don't feel like that there's any flaw in that thinking but i also feel like it should be i would like to have it ready by town meeting um and i also think that it would be more timely to have it ready for consideration for the budget process thank you thank you councillor busher councillor freeman um yeah thank you i i mean i just want to say i do um support an earlier um generate the 31st deadline but um and it's not to put undue burden on the department and by any means it's just for me really trying to um weigh this aspect of um the impact that changing rates is going to have on on low-income and working people and i it's really hard to even quantify what that means for one more however many more people to be impacted by i just i don't even really know how to articulate it but it's yeah and i think councillor pine at our last meeting spoke about this about you know folks who are already just eating i think the example used was baked potatoes for a week and i think that's why i'm i'm just really pushing for as much as i don't want to i want to respect the department and the work that y'all are doing and and not put undue burden um on our city employees i it's just i don't know that's that's that's my rationale at least thank you councillor freeman councillor hanson so my question around this and this is to anyone who who might have the answer but if we did move it up i think i agree with what councillor freeman has said and i think anything we can do to get this relief in place sooner is is beneficial if we were to move it up would that allow us to change the rates sooner or would we still need to wait until the change over of of the fiscal year because that was we've had a lot of conversations um about this and i'm not 100% clear on that but could these changes be implemented um sooner um or do you know does it require the the the change in fiscal year i don't know if any one does not regret i mean there's nothing structurally you guys could change the rates today if you wanted like can you turn that microphone to it's pointed away for me thank you um i think traditionally we have changed them at the fiscal year and i guess i don't know how to convey to you all the sort of if we're i want to do this right i want to do it comprehensively i want to flip over every stir stone because we do not in my professional opinion want to be changing things every fiscal year for a number of fiscal years customers are already confused about how water rates work and so whenever we implement a storm water utility or change rates we get a slew of questions and we're going to be fundamentally changing how how we charge for water with this potentially progressive rate structure um and so i guess i want to balance the need to bring relief sooner with you know bringing a well crafted plan we don't have our consultant on board yet once we have them on board we'll be examining how quickly we can move but i'm not going to go i'm not going to go fast at the the expense of doing it well um because i think burlingtonians deserve that and i think you all deserve that um i certainly if we can i agree getting it sooner rather than later and getting it before town meeting day is to my benefit as well um changing a council is hard for departments to manage as well because you have to bring people up to speed so we will be working towards that i just i can't professionally promise that i'm going to be able to deliver on a good product for you all by the end of january i i won't i won't promise my team to doing that there's too much else going on that i can't control if nothing else unplanned happens for the next eight months then maybe i will be here on december 31st but that is not the world that i live in so you're making clear that you cannot make that promise but that you will strive to do to do that date if possible yes i think it's to all of our advantages to figure out where we're going as quickly as possible but i i i can't make the commitment professionally that i mean even even the march 15th is potentially sooner than we would have been able to bring it um and so i was comfortable committing to that as sort of my thanks yeah thank you councillor shannon then councillor paul i just want to say that this seems um really not the way we do business here we have always when we want to change in date we work with city staff to change dates to come up with realistic dates not kind of artificially imposing a date on the council floor that the staff is telling us they can't meet i i honestly can't think and i have been here a long time as has been pointed out sometimes i can't think of a case where the staff is telling us no we can't meet that date and we do it anyway it's really disrespectful so i hope the council will not proceed down this road thank you thank you councillor shannon councillor paul and councillor pine and i'll pass so we can get on councillor paul passes councillor pine and then i'm hoping that we're ready to vote yeah he would just um say that the um the spirit of what councillor busher has proposed um while i support it i feel that we've tried hard to we've worked well with staff on this issue and we've i feel like we've in good faith worked towards something over the last couple of weeks we had a post home at which i know um from a staff perspective never is ideal but um again we serve the public and we're accountable to the citizens so um but i do feel that you know our intention you know we'd like to see this as soon as possible i trust that you will push for the soonest you can possibly deliver something um and i hopefully that march 15th is actually um you know the furthest out it would go and it will happen sooner but um i i'm probably i'm not going to be supporting this because of that thank you councillor pine i think we're ready to vote all those in favor of the amendment to change the date please say i i'm sorry all those in favor of the amendment please raise your hand and those opposed that fails by a vote of 11 to 3 and now we're back to the actual resolution um and i think we've had some significant discussion so hopefully we're ready to vote on this now unless anybody else needs to speak all those in favor of the resolution now please say i i any opposed i pass this unanimously thank you very much thank you very much thank you item 5.09 is resolution increasing access to publicly available bathroom facilities councillor ruff thank you president right i move that we waive the reading adopt the resolution and after a second ask for the floor back for some brief comments councillor ruff moves it it's seconded by councillor pine councillor ruff this resolution is a continuation of a process looking into where and when we as a city are providing publicly accessible restroom facilities throughout our community i want to thank councillor pine and jang as members of the public safety committee in supporting this coming forward the council may recall a report that aimed to map out excuse me map out where our restroom infrastructure where they are and make recommendations for various types of facilities and potential locations this is not a contained issue as it relates to conversations surrounding city place memorial and city parks including city hall park most recently in short the resolution calls on the administration to do a few things first to identify locations for adding additional publicly available restroom facilities to open existing bathrooms controlled by the city especially those in our parks and a report back in june on what short and long term solutions are available to us i'll close by noting that this is not an effort to do piecemeal budgeting this is instead a result of a multi-step process that involve both city departments and community partners in the report back date for june is intentional so we can match up this exploratory process with the city's forthcoming annual budget process thank you i feel like i flushed that out pretty well and there's not going to be a big debate here because people are leaving i'm gonna so i made an error council roof so i'm actually going to suspend this for just a moment um councillor pine just one second okay so and my mistake i thought that we had motion on the table for the last item we had the amendment on the table but i thought someone had actually moved it and apparently had not been moved so we need to go back and re-vote on the last one and i'm going to recognize councillor palino thank you president right i move item 5.08 and waive the reading to adopt the resolution to update the staffing to the structure of the public works water resources division seconded by councillor paul i hope there's no discussion okay we'll try that again my mistake i apologize for screwing that up all those in favor please say aye any opposed and that now has passed thank you and now we're back on council roof the same speech again don't give the same don't give the same speech again wasn't right i moved that way okay y'all sat it's been moved second moved and seconded any further discussion on this item okay we're ready for the vote all those in favor of this resolution please say aye aye any opposed that passes unanimously thank you council roof item 5.10 is a special event outdoor entertainment permit application this was consent agenda item 4.05 it was removed by councillor busher i believe and so i'll recognize uh councillor roof to move this laptop just broke sorry about that i will move 5.10 approval of a special event outdoor entertainment permit application for every sat every saturday may 12 2019 to october 12 2019 for bca 8am to 3pm lower block of church street bca summer artist market thank you councillor roof seconded by councillor tracy discussion councillor busher the only thank you president right the only reason i removed it was that i had asked um councillor roof about um the conflict with the jazz festival because of that one week when they have their tents up in lower church street and um and so that's why i removed it but he did get a communication from dorian craft so i don't know whether he wants to just speak briefly to that and that's the end of it i'll read directly directly from a communication from dorian craft who wasn't able to be here but i did ask her to provide a comment uh in short it reads the bca team and jazz are working very collaboratively on how we make the jazz and the the artist market successful this year chelsea the manager of jazz is excited about having the market with jazz alongside jazz and we too as are we rather there is no conflict only goodwill all right thank you councillor roof also councillor busher all right all those in favour please say aye opposed that passes unanimously thank you very much we're moving on to item number six which is committee reports any committee chair that would like to report on committee activity councillor tracy so as we talked about with the uh cswd item the transportation energy utilities committee will be meeting on may 7th at 5 30 down at dpw um in addition to the cswd item i have also asked that we discuss the um green mountain transit schedules and the college street shuttle issue that we heard about today uh wanting to get more information on um how that plan is proceeding as well as issues of fare uh charging on the college street issue on the college street route and then um if other councillor also wanting to see the committee engage in the conversation about uh the work that we'd like to do so if councillors on that committee have that work please let us know uh what you're interested in either putting on the agenda or think about what you might want to address in other agendas thank you thank you councillor tracy councillor busher so yes um as acting chair of ordinance for one item only we will be meeting on may 7th 2019 at 5 30 location to be confirmed to deal with z a 19-07 which is commercial uses elm thank you councillor busher other committee chairs council councillor shannon thank you uh thank you the PAC committee will be meeting on may 8th at 5 30 uh location to be determined and it'll be our first organizational meeting some review of uh the items that are in committee now and planning for uh what the committee wants to take up for the year thank you councillor shannon other committee chairs hearing none we'll conclude item number eight excuse me number six moved item seven which is city councillors on general city affairs uh president right and we need a motion and it's a 10 30 magic time and so councillor busher would you like to make a motion i'll move to complete the agenda do it um what is it to suspend our rules and the rules excuse me and complete our agenda councillor busher has moved that we suspend our rules and complete the agenda this needs a requires a two-thirds vote in favor all those in favor of suspending the our agenda expending suspending our rules and completing the agenda i'm having as much trouble as you were with that please say aye aye any opposed that passes and we will continue seconded i'll second if it wasn't okay did i miss that just answer shit okay okay all all those in favor aye any opposed we have suspended the rules and we are on to item number seven general city affairs councillors councillor shannon uh thank you councillor pine and i had the pleasure of meeting with a delegation of mayors and city councillors from jordan um and it was a very interesting conversation and one of the things that came up was uh they have a lot of refugees from syria in jordan and as we discussed further it um i asked them how many refugees they had and they said it's 110 of the population and at first we thought that they meant it was like a 10 increase in their population but in fact what he means is there are more refugees in their community than there are uh citizens and i asked them where do they all live do they live on the street how do you accommodate that many people as our country country is so worried um about the refugees that that we have taken in and uh and concerns that refugees are going to be bust to burlington which we have said we we welcome them i think um and they said well we consider them our arab brothers and sisters and we take them into our homes and i thought that that was just you know it it was just a really profound moment for me uh and made me reflect on why we have these you know why we have sister city relationships and um the council on world affairs and having these kind of exchanges really are meaningful to us um and there were a woman also there were translators involved in our discussions uh and one of the women in the group asked if as a woman sometimes do i feel that sometimes i'm not listened to because i'm a woman and the translator translated the question and then there was a lot of conversation in a language that i don't understand um and then the translator translated what he was saying to her which was that um she was talking too much and that she shouldn't she shouldn't ask so many questions um i believe it was her first question and there was another man who had been talking quite a lot uh but they was also interesting that they have quotas for women on their council uh but that it's becoming more successful so that women are starting to win seats beyond the quotas that are that are you know required for for women so they do feel like they are making some progress on that but i would encourage counselors to take advantage of these opportunities that we have to to meet with um foreign government officials because it is it's it's pretty amazing we learn a lot also i want to um again uh just remind people about the 2030 district meeting which is um about uh making our buildings more efficient and addressing climate change in that way um in ways that are uh economically effective and and market driven even um but can make a real difference and the meeting is at 5 30 on monday at i'm sorry on wednesday may first this wednesday um and i'm sorry i need to look up main street landing that's where it is thanks thank you councillor shannon councillor busher um yes i i guess i need the mayor to educate me on a couple of things one is the college street shuttle this seemed to catch me off guard that i thought we partnered with uvm to help pay for that free shuttle so i was confused by this conversation and um maybe i i need someone to point me in the direction to get educated about what's going on because this was a big surprise to me um the second thing is um is it mr glasberg is is the person that interfaces with the with the town center and um if he's overseeing that maybe he should be reporting to us on a regular basis that's a question i once again have for the administration i'm not sure that's the right thing to do but it seemed like um they were meeting with him and maybe we should get information from him also so those are two questions for the mayor to ponder or point me in some direction to get to get answers to the last thing is i was in boston last week and they were having a pilot of e scooters and the mayor of boston came on tv and said no way know how not yet because of safety issues with e scooters so i just wanted to report that to everybody here thank you thank you councillor busher and the mayor can either respond in his final comments or he can talk to you wait i didn't mean yes yeah i know you don't any other councillor on general city affairs councillor freeman i just wanted to announce quickly that we've organized for the ward two and three npa on may ninth uh thursday may ninth to have a section regarding public safety and have invited the chief of police and um our like liaison from the community justice center um there were folks that had questions about the uh shootings that had occurred in the neighborhood and just wanted to make sure that the public knew that we would be having that forum and it's it would be a good place to come and um be part of that discussion and address concerns thank you councillor freeman any other city councillor hearing none we will conclude that item and item eight i have no announcement to make at this time so i'm going to move ahead to mr mayor general affairs take us home mr mayor great thank you president right um uh so i wanted to note um a couple um milestones uh that that i think the council the public should be aware of and uh we did put out a press release on this um but i encourage people who haven't checked it out to go to the mayor's page and see it is uh the arborist has committed the city's arborist has committed to a plan where this year 360 new street trees will be um planted which is really an impressive total when you consider that um at least there we haven't gone back decades and decades but you know a big year a few years ago was considered to be about 140 150 trees in a year um so this is a big jump from that uh i think it's really uh interesting and exciting the uh the way in which um uh vj comai the new arborist is bringing new methods and and new technologies um to bear to make this possible um the um one of the methods that uh the public i think should be aware of is using volunteers uh to do the tree planting we had the first um of these uh out in a new north end community this past weekend it was a community we started with because uh there's a real need to increase the number of street trees being planted because we are expecting the emerald ash borer to be hitting berlington in the coming years and that's going to have likely a devastating impact on our ash tree population this neighborhood is at least in the the five blocks that the volunteers were focused on is nearly a hundred percent ash trees on on the street but there will be additional volunteer efforts throughout the season into the fall we'll be planting in the fall as well and you can find more information about that um in the in the release we put out last week another you know notable uh milestone that's been in the news recently and that i think speaks to some of the conversations we had here tonight is um that uh and this was a surprise to me that we were doing as well as on this as we were berlington has been named the fourth city in the country per capita in terms of solar installation um which is uh you know uh something that is really come about um we have very little solar in 2011 and we have increased the amount 16 times since then and um the uh berlington is unique um in northeast cities making it high onto that list and i think it really speaks to the efforts of the berlington election department has spearheaded with their solar shopper efforts with their partnerships with the schools and the university and the airport and um we're gonna we're gonna as you know we'll be talking more about this as we come back with the the roadmap to get to net zero but um uh just thought this would be some of the public and then the council would want to be be clear on um is uh an interesting sign of the progress we're making together um looking ahead this weekend is maybe the best weekend of the year in berlington we will have little league opening day i'm gonna make it to all three leagues if i can or the gbgsl soccer league starts up this weekend as well it's also a green up day on saturday um information uh is available through the parks and rec on some details about how you can get involved in the green up day activities this weekend and then we're looking ahead one further uh week another great parks event is uh kids day coming up on may 11th and uh hope uh hope to see everyone um out there uh for that great tradition as well um i think uh with that um um president right i'll turn it back to you i'm not talking to you thank you mr mayor uh i think we're ready to adjourn is there a move to adjourn so moved council roof seconded by councilor freeman all those in favor please say aye any opposed we are adjourned