 So good evening, today is Monday, March 11th, 2024. Happy Daylight Savings to everyone. It is 6.20 at night and it is broad daylight outside. We finally have reached the halfway mark in the month of March, or almost the halfway mark in March. Thank you so much for joining us in person in Contois and online for the Burlington City Council meeting. It is 6.20, the first item on our agenda is item 1.1, which is a motion to adopt the agenda. I will go to Councillor Doherty for a motion to adopt the agenda. Thank you, President Paul. I would like to make a motion to amend and adopt the agenda as follows. Add to the consent agenda item 7.21, communication, survey, overview, ward two, regarding flawed memorial block pre-development agreement is not ready for signature. Add to the consent agenda item 7.22, communication, survey, overview, regarding March 9, 2024, FPF discussion item posted to one central FPF in three parts, misleading one, memorial block pre-development agreement. Add to the consent agenda item 7.23, communication, survey, overview, regarding missing and misrepresented timeline items on CEDOS March 11, 2024 memo regarding the memorial gateway block pre-development agreement, one. Add to the consent agenda item 7.24, communication, Jack Keano, regarding inclusionary zoning. Add to the consent agenda item 7.25, communication, Michael Long, regarding concerns regarding neighborhood code as currently drafted. Remove from the agenda items 8.6 and 8.7 and place them on the consent agenda as agenda items 7.26 and 7.27 respectively per city council president Paul. Thank you so much, Councillor Doherty. Is there a second to that motion? Seconded by Councillor Barlow. Is there any discussion on the motion on adopting the agenda? Seeing none, all those in favor of the agenda as amended, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. We have our agenda and I will also acknowledge that we have Councillor Jang, Councillor Travers and Councillor King joining us by Zoom. And that brings us to the beginning of our evening, which is an exciting presentation on the city's plans for the solar eclipse 2024, which is item 2.1. We're less than 30 days away from this once-in-a-lifetime event. We have with us this evening Burlington City Arts Director Doreen Kraft as well as Zach Williamson Festival and Event Director for BCA and Samantha McGinnis who is the Assistant Director for Downtown Projects and Events with the Downtown and Workforce Development. Welcome, welcome to each of you. Thank you for joining us this evening. We have allotted 45 minutes for this agenda item, which is really to inform the council and the greater community about our exciting plans for this event. And Director Kraft, I think you had wanted to make some brief comments and then we'll go to the others. So the floor is yours. Thank you so much. I mean, it's a delight to be here and to be with all of you and to be a part of the city that is going to throw out the biggest red carpet we've ever thrown out for welcoming the perhaps 100,000, 150,000 plus people who will come through our community during that long weekend in April. It is something that's unimaginable in some ways and yet fantastic and magnificent in others when you think about what is going to occur. I think it's taken our community a long time to really grasp what this means, the specialness, the mysticalness of it and what it can bring to our community. And the way that both Cara and myself, Cara Alnaswari who is the Director of Business and Workforce Development. When we imagine this, it was very much about how do we celebrate what Burlington is, how do we highlight and emphasize the strength and the character of who we are, the talent that exists here and the hospitality that we provide for people who visit as well as for our own community members. So there's been a significant amount of work that has been done to ensure first of all public safety is at the top of our list, both for our community and for our visitors, but also that there is some delight and enjoyment when you are here and visiting and some discovery about how tremendous this community is. So we couldn't do this without collaboration and partnership and I want to thank a few of those people who have been a significant part of the work that we've done to date. Hello Burlington, UVM, first Unitarian Universalist Church, Main Street Landing, the Hilton Burlington Lake Champlain, Burlington Beer Company, Echo Center for Lake Champlain. They have all with other departments in the city, parks and recreation, DPW, the library, all of our emergency services of both the fire and police have been in strong and constant collaboration. As we move this forward from an idea to a reality and we begin to think about how do you execute during this time so that you can bring both joy and safety to everyone who chooses to be a part of it. So we have thought both about how to bring many of our neighbors together in the communities, in the neighborhood where they live as well as our downtown, our parks as a place where many of our visitors can go. And I think you'll see through the presentation tonight, it's a very thoughtful way of walking through this and imagining how we see our city. And as we talk tonight, there are still events that are being imagined and people who are coming to the table and telling us these are their intentions during that time. We're doing our best to make sure that all of this information is on our website so that if you have any questions as a resident or a visitor, you will be able to find that instantaneously and we will have an app that is developed so that during your visit or during that time, you will be able to find out everything that you will need to know how to be and to enjoy during the eclipse. And I think Zach will talk a little bit more about our public meeting, where we're going to bring our community together so everyone can ask the questions about that day. And as we get closer, more and more questions come up so we're always available for responding, not just to the questions you may have tonight for us, but also to the community as well. So I'll pass it on to Zach. Excellent, yeah, thank you. As Doreen said, this is a truly special occasion and one thing that we're clear on is it's a once in a lifetime opportunity to really showcase Burlington. It's tricky, some of the media out there and some of the messaging is like, Burlington's gonna be chaos, don't come here and we wanna strike a balance by actually welcoming a lot of people here and making a safe experience for the residents and for our visitors and we actually do in reality want people to come here. Yes, it will be crowded, yes, it'll be some traffic, but we think we have a really great event planned. We, just to give a little bit of background, I think a lot of you have seen this in different ways, but we are, as I said, extremely fortunate that the eclipse is coming, the total, we're in the path of totality. Most of the United States is not in the path of totality. You can see on this map, it stretches from Texas all the way to Maine. We are really, really smack dab in the middle of it. As you can see, our timing here, just as a review, we'll start a partial eclipse, which is what we had in September, actually, starts at 2.14 p.m. It gets darker and darker all the way to truly pitch black at 3.26. We have a prime three minutes of totality. Point of information, we can't hear you. You can't hear me? Online, we cannot hear you. Okay, thanks for letting us know. Can you hear me, Councillor Johnne? For now, it's perfect, it's good now. Thank you. Okay, great. Maybe I should be closer. So at 3.26, we begin totality. That is when the, I have to always get this right, the moon is directly in front of the sun. We are in that exact spot where it will truly obscure the total sun. That is the point where it actually is safe enough to take off your solar glasses. You can actually look at that when there's just that ring around the sun. You can actually safely look at that. That lasts for about three minutes and then it will gradually get back to daylight going all the way to 4.37. I've read and I've talked to people there is really nothing like the bean in the path of totality. It doesn't have the same, you don't have the same experience at all. If you're a couple miles outside of totality or you're not anywhere near totality, you'll see that partial kind of glow and that haze. But the bean in totality is truly a life-changing experience. That is why we are expecting thousands of people to come here because it is a rare opportunity. If you're anywhere near this, you really do want to get to a place where you can experience totality. People say it's life-changing. People equate it to getting married or giving birth. I don't know if it'll reach those levels for any of us, but it does for some people and there are people who travel all around the world seeking opportunities to be in a total solar eclipse. We are honestly excited to do this, which is really great. We made a, we kind of, oops, I have to use this maybe. We went with this idea of the sun being obscured and we landed on this umbrella of Obscura BTV. This is, as Doreen said, not just what the city is directly producing and supporting, but it is also our complete community events. Anyone who's doing anything in the Burlington area can submit their events to us and we'll get it on the website and Sam will talk about some of those events a little bit later. But this branding has really been our key to launching this whole event and to looking at what we can do here to create a positive experience over a multi-day. You'll see it says April 5th to April 8th. That is because we have programming that actually starts even before April 5th, but the bulk of our programming is that Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday experience because most hotels have two, if not three night minimums. We do think people will get here for a long weekend and spend time in our city and want things to do. Also spend money in our city and eat in our restaurants and buy from our stores so it really is a great opportunity to create something special for the city to do. I will say it's not at the best time of year. April 8th is not exactly the time to showcase Burlington, but we'll see. So far, it hasn't been a severe winter so we'll see what happens on April 8th. But that was really the goal of the Obscura brand was both to produce our own events and create viewing sites, which we'll talk about next, but also make a place where we could host everybody else's events and share them widely. I think if I do that, there we go. Yeah, I think Sam is gonna talk about a little of our structure. Thank you. So I'm gonna talk a little bit about the structure of how we've been approaching Obscura BTV. So this, as Doreen alluded to earlier, has been a project that the entire city staff has been working on. We've been thinking of it in three buckets internally, so communications, preparedness, and operations. We have weekly meetings in most of these buckets to talk about the eclipse and get ready for it. The communications team, preparedness team, and operations team have members from the BCA, BWD, Parks and Rec, DPWU, the police force, fire. Everybody is involved in these meetings and it's a great way for us to connect and communicate and continue to push forward all of the plans that we're working on. I wanna go to the next slide. These are some of the projects that we're working on in these buckets. These are just a glimmer of them. There are lots more that we are working on, but communications is working on our website, newsletter, social media, merchandise, the app. Preparedness is traffic, parking, emergency response, trash and recycling for that day, statewide coordination, and then operations is the viewing sites, event management, bathrooms, public transportation, info tents, and NPAs. So it's really something that we are tackling from a number of different ways and a number of different departments to make sure we are all on the same page. We are also working closely with businesses and business collaborations so making sure that we are getting all this information out to Burlington businesses and residents about what we're working on and what they can expect that weekend and that day. I will just add to that that obviously this falls solidly into other duties as assigned and this was on our usual jobs, but there is a huge number of people in the city making this happen along with all the other work so it really is a cool project in that sense that we're doing this on top of everything else so it's pretty awesome. That's one word to describe it, I guess. As we talked about preparedness and safety is a big plan, a big part of our planning from the very beginning we've been working closely with police fire, EMS, and DPW on our plans here in the city and creating our road closure map which we're gonna look at in a second, but it's been at the forefront of what we're doing. One thing that's interesting to note is on July, in the beginning we were trying to compare this to the marathon or July 3rd, what's really different about this is that those events happen only, well, July 3rd for a lot of ways only happens here in Burlington. Most other communities celebrate on July 4th or don't have as big a fire or display, but this event is happening across the whole northwestern part or the whole northern part of Vermont so the state resources aren't really there at the same level so we learned early on that the state police wouldn't be sending the same team they send to Waterfront Park, they need to be in Williston and we wouldn't have the same support from some of our other state services so there has been a lot of coordination in that but in general for a state our size this event is stretching everybody thin so we are working with those partners and we're all in communication but it is a tricky balancing act. To that end I did attend Vermont Emergency Management Meeting and we shared our plans here in Burlington with the state team. We've also been in very close coordination with the UVM police, the state police and all the neighboring jurisdictions around Inchitening County. On the day of we'll be opening the Emergency Operations Center, Fire Chief LaChance will be running that show and we've talked about the structure, the command structure, should anything happen how we can make sure that we have enough staff across the city to deal with any usual circumstances that happen day to day here in Burlington or a special type of circumstance because of this event. And yeah, as we've already said this but our plan really does involve all the emergency services here in Burlington as well as parking, traffic, streets, parks and rec, BCA, BWD, we're all involved in this pretty deeply. Looking at the road closures which actually is probably one of the biggest questions we get. I think this map's a little hard to see but you can find this map on our website which is burlingtoneclipse.com. This road map closure, is it dot? Work. I think it's com. Pretty sure, it says on there. Dot com, yeah. Dot org, oh my gosh, I've said that wrong a few times. Okay, so dot org. This map was developed really with a couple key priorities. One was to create a parking area. Another was to create safe pedestrian corridors throughout the city. And then another was to find a balancing act between closing roads and inconveniencing people and making it already a hard day, somewhat harder, and also closing them in enough time that we can do what we need to do. So we are closing a fair number of roads in the waterfront and Old North End region. That is basically because we assume that most people are gonna be in Waterfront Park or Battery Park and we also have a lot of people downtown. So by closing College Street, which will be closed, as you can see from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., we're providing a safe corridor for pedestrians to get from the church street downtown area down to the waterfront and vice versa. That'll leave traffic traveling on Main Street and keep the cars off the same streets as the pedestrians. We also can have probably a smoother transport car situation without a lot of people trying to cross those streets. And then down at the waterfront for both safety, mainly for safety, we are closing Lake Street to local traffic only. If you live down there, we've been in touch with a lot of those people. We can get you a permit. If you have a business down there, those businesses can still access and provide service, but there will be no just casual traffic or going to Park at the skate park won't be an option. So that Lake Street will be closed just for local traffic and pedestrians. That was out of an abundance of caution really. We just want to make sure that there's no cars down there that don't need to be down there and that we can not worry so much about blockading places of mass gathering to make for safety. If we already closed the streets, it's a good buffer there. So we feel pretty confident about that. If we jump up to the Beltline Route 127, that is and was our only really available place to park a lot of cars. UVM is in session and has their own parking constraints. There really isn't a great place around here and you need to be on a hard surface. It's April and mud season. So we are closing Route 127, the full length of it from Plasper Gav in the North to Manhattan Drive. And that will be closed starting at 10 a.m. We are charging $30 to park your car up to five people out there. We will park in an orderly fashion on the Eastern side of that road, we headed North. And we have staff out there. You can pay with a QR code and we will park those cars sequentially. And then we are running. You can start to park cars at 11 30. We'll be set up free out there above bathrooms out there as well. And then at noon, our first shuttle buses will be running. We're working with Green Mountain Transit and Premier Coach to run a shuttle buses from Route 127 while shuttle stops. And then Park Street is closed to provide that access. So you'll get picked up on Route 27, shoot down Park Street and get delivered down at near one main street on Lake Street there by the Main Street, Main Street Landing Parking Lot. So to that end, Park Street is closed, Battery Street from Main Street to Sherman Street is closed and then North Street is closed up to, sorry, North Ave is closed up to North Street. Residents in the North End, a new North End can still get through where they need to go because they can come down North Ave and head onto North Street. And from there you can get across the city and then head back downtown. But this was really the only way to move a lot of people and get them down to the waterfront, assuming that, knowing that we have a lot of people driving here. I will just note, a big question mark is how many people are coming, that's fair. We don't know either, that's been a nagging thing that we just don't know. But anecdotally, we do get emails on a daily basis of people coming from Massachusetts, people coming from Boston, people coming from Maine, college bringing up two tour buses with 90 people each from, you know, Western, upstate New York. So there is a lot of interest in coming here and we are confident that we will have plenty of people to accommodate, whether or not it's 100,000, we don't know, but if it's even 50,000, it's still more than we're usually prepared to accommodate here in Burlington. We will also just a note, be closing St. Paul Street right here, adjacent to City Hall Park. That is to create a food vending obscure after party, we're calling it, in City Hall Park. That'll go a little bit later. That goes till eight o'clock at night. Um, awesome. So then we can dive into the more exciting stuff. This is the actual event. And, you know, Sam is gonna tell you what other people are doing also, but I will just touch on what we're doing. One of the keys to the actual day are these official viewing sites. So we've created quite a few of them all in parks around Burlington. These are both for residents and for visitors. But there's some specifics here that we can just, I won't go into all of it, but you can see that we're in Battery Park from one to five. We are psyched. We've got the all night boogie band playing in the band shell there. They said that was a bucket list item for them, so they were excited to get the offer. We have DJ Disco Phantom, the legend from Winooski coming and playing with us there. We'll have a merchandise and glasses tent. So at every one of our viewing sites, you can buy merch, you can buy your glasses. We'll also have an information point, just a person there who can help point you in the right direction. If you're a visitor, answer any questions, tell you where to get your glasses, where the bathrooms are. We'll also working with Echo and they'll have an educational tent with their own staff and volunteers working in there to help people learn about the eclipse from a more scientific standpoint. And then we'll have 16 portable bathrooms there. We are closing Battery Street and half of it will be for people to gather. So from 12 to five, people can be standing on the western, the southbound lanes of Battery Street. And that's a great, actually a great place to see the eclipse. It's kind of a release valve. If all of our parks are full, it'll allow people to migrate both up from the waterfront and down from Battery Park onto Battery Street and stand in the street there. Jay Kalu is gonna do some drumming down there. It's a great option when you don't have a lot of electricity or sound system nearby and they're gonna provide a great energy for viewing down on Battery Street. We'll also be selling a merchandising glasses at the Cherry Street intersection on the western side of Battery Street. In Waterfront Park, that's one to five. The entire park is gonna be available for viewing. So most big concerts and events that happen in Waterfront Park only happen in the event space, the bigger lawn, further north. But we will have a distributed sound system that is throughout that whole park, not like a concert vibe, but more of a communication and background music vibe. We are very cognizant of the lawn and that this is an early spring event. And we don't wanna do any damage that we don't have to do to the lawn. So there will be music. We are psyched to have Allie T, who has taken advantage of the totality in her own marketing. I was thrilled to see that. But Allie T is a great musician from South Royalton. And we have Micah Helley, a great musician right here in Burlington. And then we have DJ Kwame, who plays After The Eclipse. We're also working really closely with WCAX. They are a media, our presenting media sponsor. They'll be doing a live broadcast from our stage in Waterfront Park as well. And their hosts will be hosting our event in the park as well. We also have two merchandise and glass tents, two information points, one eco-educational tent. We're gonna have water available and six food tents and trucks, 30 bathrooms. And a couple other things about there. The Skate Park parking lot will be closed that whole day and the boat launch parking area will be closed as well in Waterfront Park. I'll move a little bit quicker. Perkins Pier is a little bit calmer. We will have paid parking down there as well. That lot is great if you can get a spot. It'll be a little bit quieter. One merchandise tent and a glasses tent and we'll have three extra bathrooms there. Oakledge Park, we are focusing on accessibility. We are really excited to have some options down there including, I forget the exact name of it, but I think it's called Listen and Look. I think it's an accessory for visually impaired people that sends us to light and makes, creates sound and so you can actually listen to the eclipse in a way and experience it that way. So we're very lucky. Echo has one of those and we'll have two of them in Oakledge Park and we are working with the great group Oakledge for All to talk about, to kind of showcase the fact that there's that universal playground there. We'll have a merchandise tent and three additional bathrooms right here in City Hall Park. That's a great viewing site. We'll have DJ Crowd Control playing in the afternoon and then we've got the Moon Dogs which is a band from UVM playing in the evening for the obscure after party. We'll have glasses and we're closing the street and we'll have food trucks and food vendors on St. Paul Street and additional bathrooms and Roosevelt Park finally is really being targeted for the families and kids. We'll have music and family activities. Again, merchandise and glasses and there will be a tent there that's streaming the NASA feed of a live stream of the eclipse. That'll be an attempt so you can actually see it in the daylight and they'll be streaming some NASA material from there and Letty Park is a viewing site because it has a great parking lot and it's up on the New North End but that's gonna be pretty calm there. It's gonna be beautiful enough, I think. You can get down by the water and experience the eclipse there and we're gonna be using the facilities that are built in there to both sell merchandise and the bathrooms there. I think that is most of that. Yeah. Web site. We're gonna quickly go through a few more things and leave some time for questions. So up on our website, we have the event calendar. So the event calendar has all the events that the city of Burlington team is producing for Obscura BTV as well as highlighting what all of the businesses around town are doing so you can check this out. You can go to Love Burlington and check it out from there. Some of the things we're really excited about are the totality talks we're doing in partnership with UVMs. We have different UVM professors coming ahead of the eclipse to talk about different eclipse themes. We have a ton of awesome programming that weekend leading up to the event. So we have a partnership with VTIF for a short film series as well as Space Odyssey will be in here in Con Toys on Saturday evening. We have Zoe Keating in the UU, Randall Pierce, Song to the Moon on Sunday as well as a special Obscura BTV market that will be happening down at the Hilton highlighting a lot of our local artists and makers. So we definitely encourage folks to check out all that's happening in Burlington that weekend on our website. In addition, especially my work has been a lot with outreach and connecting with the business community here in Burlington and asking them to consider opening additional hours on Sunday and Monday if they're not currently opening to add to the welcoming atmosphere here in Burlington, especially those that are restaurants or food businesses knowing we're gonna have a lot of extra people in town that need to be fed. Also asking folks to add any events that they have to that calendar. So we know folks like Siba, the Get Down, Hula, Echo, Santiago's folks are doing really awesome events that weekend and that day. So making sure we're getting that word out to not only locals but all those that are coming to visit here in Burlington. We've talked a lot about merch, but here I have the merch, some of the merch that we are selling. So a lot of you, I believe, have glasses up there to look at. We have received our glasses. We are starting to sell those at the BCA gallery. You can find those Wednesday through Saturday there as well as postcards, stickers, magnets, photo filters, yo-yos, on-demand t-shirts, sweatshirts and commemorative posters. See if some awesome merch available. We are also working with CSWD, who has partnered with Astronomers Without Borders for an Eclipse Glass Recycling Program. So at the Eclipse itself, we will have bins and volunteers to collect glasses after everyone has viewed them. They will then take these glasses and give them to Astronomers Without Borders who will then bring these to various countries throughout the world for the next eclipse so folks can have access to Eclipse glasses. So we're really excited about that initiative for recycling. Along with March, now we're gonna pivot to talk a bit about budgets. So you can do communications. Oh, so in getting information out, we have been working with NPAs. So I have been working to provide kits to NPAs. Each NPA will get a kit. Those include 500 glasses for them to give out to their neighborhood, 10 solar stamp filters, telescopes, sunspotters, and educational information from ECHO about how to safely view the eclipse. So we're excited to be partnering with all those NPAs. In addition, just wanted to talk a little bit about what's going on with other larger community partners that day. You are probably aware, but it will be a half day for school that day so schools be letting out at 11.45 a.m. In addition, UVM will be having alternative instruction day that day. So instead of going to class, students will be encouraged to do this alternative instruction day. They have five viewing sites on campus, encouraging students to stay on campus and not come into the downtown. All others will be encouraged to work from home that day. Champlain will have a normal class day, but they'll be taking a break for eclipse viewing. Cool. Yes, and we can talk about budget and then we'll end with our update on a little bit more of our media partnerships. On the budget, if you remember, we passed a resolution back on October 23rd that secured funding. We are on track to meet in that resolution was a fundraising goal and we are on track to meet that fundraising goal. We're so excited to have a lot of great support. Those people who are sponsoring us include Northfield Savings Bank, a bunch of hotels, which is Hotel Vermont, Courtyard, Burlington, Marriott, Hilton Garden Inn, Hilton, Burlington Lake Champlain, and we also have support from the BTV Lay International Airport and we have media sponsorship from WCAX and Seven Days. While we have met our fundraising goal, we actually are meeting our spending goal, which is always good as well. So we are using literally every penny of that allotted budget that we have. This is a large event. We are accomplishing more than we set out to accomplish with the money that was appropriated for this, but it is a big event and a lot of expenses across the board to do all this work and we're really trying to do it in a very thoughtful way. So there will be extra bathrooms, actually downtown starting on Friday. There'll be bathrooms out on the Route 127 parking area. So we really are trying to create a great experience and really spend this money wisely. We also have really diversified part of that resolution also is that we're obviously gonna make some money directly and that include, we diversified how we're gonna do that. Samantha talked about the merchandise, but we've really kind of spent some time with a bunch of people talking about what items people might wanna sell. We did some research and talked to other Eclipse places. So we are selling glasses, we're selling magnets, we're selling this other merchandise. We are, in our proposal, we included parking fees, so we are charging people to park out on the belt line as well and then we also have ticketed events during that weekend that are helping to also make us some money. So the Zoe Keating and the two shows in here, one on Saturday and two on Sunday, all are ticketed events that will help us generate some income as well. So we're looking forward to welcoming people to those events and we're selling tickets to help raise some money for that. And the last thing we wanted to talk about was this, we have a couple more things. As Doreen mentioned, every Burlington resident got a great mailer. We took after the campaigns and did our own mailer and so this went to every resident and it's both sharing that we are, this eclipse is happening, but also, as we said, be totality informed to BTV. It shares that we will have a info session in here in Contoyce on March 21st at 6 p.m. I got that idea after a PAC meeting actually. We did so much explaining about the eclipse and our plans. I thought that we should do that for everybody. So we will be opening that up to the public and Channel 17 is partnering with us to stream that as well. So we're hoping that we can get a lot of great information out to people and not only get them prepared for this weekend, but then get them excited for this weekend. So we're really looking forward to that. And then I mentioned our WCAX partnership. I just wanna play this awesome commercial because they really came to City Hall Park and put on our merch and had a great commercial and after this we'll be ready for questions and I'm happy to talk up more about it. I think you'll hear this. Oh, maybe not. It's not going. Well, oh, I know what I have to do. Hang on one second. I gotta share this. Oh no, I mute that one second because it opened in a new window so I have to share this window too. Well, we'll skip the ad. You'll have to, you can see the ad on WCAX. I'd love to play it but the audio's not playing but they did produce a really great looking ad and we're thrilled to be working with them and have their support. You can see it at least but you can't hear it. But you see a great shot of people in City Hall Park wearing our merchandise and we're really excited that this is all happening and to have their support broadcasting this is really, really awesome. So with that I think we'll welcome any feedback or questions or comments and we're glad you all have glasses now. You can watch the clip safely as well. So I think it's really gonna be great. Great, thanks so much. Can certainly tell that all of you are excited and as are many people. So we have just a couple of minutes remaining but certainly we can go to questions or comments from City Council if you have any questions or on this amazing event. And we do have Councillor Jang, Councillor King and Councillor Hightower joining us by Zoom. If we can possibly get the screen so that we can see the others that are joining us that would be helpful just so I know that just so I can sort of keep track. That's great. Councillor Jang, please go ahead. Yes, I know we don't have a lot of time but do you know anything about the weather on those three days? It's gonna be gorgeous. It's gonna be clear and sunny. You're gonna see without a problem. Yeah, is there an advanced meteorological forecast that you can get or no? No, I mean if you look at the statistics it's not promising. April, early April in particular has a very low percentage of not cloudy days but the weather for better or worse continues to be abnormal so you never know. Okay, great, thank you. I know that Parks, Art and Culture has been getting updated on this often so they may have other questions. Councillor Bergman. Thanks, we have no time so I'll be quick. Glasses cost? Three dollars. Three dollars and people can get them. It's a donation and if anybody, we have underwriting for glasses for anyone who can't afford the glasses. And they're also being given out in the schools and the NPAs are also getting 500 pairs each to get out within their neighborhoods that are free. Perfect, Beltline parking capacity? 500. And where's the spillover? I think we're working on actually increasing the capacity a little bit more so we're thinking it's closer to a thousand and the largest problem we might be able to park even more cars than that but moving that many people is the real challenge and so we're gonna cap it around there but overflow is a good question. There's really not a great place to go. Okay, traffic control? Yep, we're working with Burlington Police and with UVM police and then we've hired Green Mountain Flagging will be at a lot of our intersections so we have people, uniform personnel at most of the major intersections definitely directing people to get to 127. It's not an easy place to get to when you are getting off the interstate necessarily and new to Burlington but we have a plan to move people with variable message signing and staff at those intersections and traffic control throughout the downtown as well as crossing guards will be working on Church Street. Let me just say we're directing people to go to parks and so they're not all in the downtown got parks in Roosevelt Park is my neighborhood like I can walk there so no problem with that but other people might come for like the tent with NASA and so that I'm sure you're thinking about it I just wanted to raise that as a flag and you talked about pedestrians you talked about cars my last question relates to bikes how are we dealing with people who are going around the bikes? Yep, we're working with local motion so we haven't quite ironed it out but they'll have a presence at Waterfront Park probably on the southern end of that park closer to Echo and then we are with the closed streets you are allowed to ride your bike on those streets so it actually is a great day to ride your bike in Burlington perhaps because you will have streets without cars on them but that is our having some system of bike valet is our goal at Waterfront Park and then we encourage bike traffic as well we think we'll be riding on bikes actually to get around. Thanks. Thank you so much, Councilor Bergman can't see the screen but it doesn't appear as though there's anyone who is anyone who's a Councilor, I think Councilor Chang you weren't raising your hand were you or were you? I was actually allowing for other people to ask questions we received this presentation so many times at park but again I think since the beginning of the planification I mean I think we expressed some concern that the new north end is not getting any type of programming and I think this plan is final and still no programming in the new north end on top of it we also closing 127 I think from my perspective we could have bring a little bit of equity into this so that we know all neighborhoods and all children all grandchildren also will be able to have some level of fun on top of just watching the eclipse just wanting to say that out there, thank you. Great thanks so much, thank you so much Councilor Chang seeing no others. Just one last thought here we still can use volunteers and we welcome all city Councilors who would like to spend part of the day or part of the weekend with us to be in touch our success at reimbursing the city for the cost of this which I know is on all of your minds means that we run a well-oiled machine and have as many people in our information and merchandise tents and also just there to support the community so if you'd like to spend a few hours with us that would be lovely. Neighbors, just others who might like to volunteer it's a great experience it'll be a lot of fun and we have a need for somewhere between 25 and 30 additional people trying to get the word out through all of our different channels and thought this would be a good time tonight to let you know as well. So thank you. And where do we direct them or how do we direct them? I would say to give Zach a call. No there's a place on our website BurlingtonEclipse.org that you can sign up and we would get in touch with people. Okay, Councilor Carpenter. Just that same lazy person that I am could you send us an email with that information and we can get it out to our... That'd be great. Definitely. Thank you. We certainly can all participate in that and certainly have access to front porch form and whatever we can get out particularly if you can give us a template. Yeah, we have a schedule and we can talk to people very specifically about what they've been doing would be doing, et cetera. So yeah. Great, wonderful. Seeing no other Councilors in the queue we'll close out this item with our thanks to the entire city team. This is a major, major effort across all departments and we appreciate all that you're doing. Thank you also for being here this evening. We'll move on to our next agenda item which is item 3.1, the Shelburne Street Roundabout Evaluation for 2023, year one. For this item we have Laura Wheelock, Senior Public Works Engineer Julia Yorowski who is also a Public Works Engineer and we're looking forward to your presentation on the evaluation of traffic data and crash data and public input to evaluate the functionality of the roundabout. So welcome to each of you. Thank you for joining us this evening. We've allotted about 20 minutes or so if you could possibly limit your comments to about 10 and then we'll go to questions from the Council please. That sounds good. Could I be added as- And just make sure that you're speaking right into the microphone. They're saying that it's hard for them, hard for people to hear who are joining us online. I will speak right into the microphone. Could I be, oh, there we go. Just joining the Zoom. So while that all connects, Laura Wheelock, Public Works Engineer. So when the roundabout was selected as a preferred alternative for the project, we had a discussion with the Council there at the time about the design alternatives that we were choosing. And one of the conditions that came with choosing this single-lane roundabout is that we would measure and monitor it post-construction. And so that is what we're here to go over tonight is our first data point. In reasonable transportation practices, we wait about six months to kind of let the roundabout settle out any kinks before we start data collection. So Julia can give an update on what that involved. Sure. Actually, first we're gonna go through a little bit of history and some photos from construction. So most of you probably remember what this intersection looked like before the roundabout, but it was a five-way mess, technical term. Construction started with a bunch of underground utility reconstruction, which included sewer main work, a humongous stormwater tank, and then also duct banks for the underground communications and electrical utilities going through this area. Finally, in June of 2022, you could start to see the roundabout taking shape. There were still some detours in place, but we saw the center of the roundabout taking shape. Then in August of 2022, they started pouring the truck apron in the center. And finally, in November of 2022, the roundabout had its grand opening. So it's just fun to revisit a little bit of this history as we think about not only Burlington's first roundabout, but our entire county's first roundabout. So part of the evaluation plan, one piece is traffic data. Next, we'll look at crash data and public input. But the data points that we're looking at for traffic are the average daily traffic volumes on all five approaches to the roundabout. And we're looking to just kind of monitor these changes over time. It's not that often that we collect so much data in one place for so many years, so this will be really interesting for us to look back on. We only have one year of data so far, so there's not a ton of patterns to discern yet. We're also looking at peak hour volumes, so that's the hour of the day that had the most cars going through the roundabout. And we are comparing those to some of the projected volumes from the design team when this was happening in 2009, when you guys approved the preferred alternative, I guess. So one piece of info is that the peak hour volumes are a little bit lower than what was expected. And that may be one of the reasons the roundabout is performing so well, which we'll get to in the next slide. We are also looking at the approach speeds to the roundabout just to monitor and make sure speeds aren't increasing too much approaching the roundabout. I will mention we took these, we did this data collection at different locations relative to where the roundabout was, so some we were able to set up a traffic counter like within 50 feet of the intersection, others had to be a little bit further back. But for the most part, we're seeing speeds pretty consistent with what we're expecting. A couple of the approaches had higher speeds, we had an 85th percentile speed of 35 on South Willard Street. So we are continuing to monitor those and if it is a persistent issue, we will put that street into the traffic calming program to look at improvements there. So we're also looking at side street delay on the two side streets that are really close to the roundabout on Shelburne Street, so that's Adams Court and Gove Court. We haven't seen any issues, this is the average delay, so for Adams Court, most people waited about 30 seconds to turn off and Gove Court is about 10 seconds, that's totally normal within thresholds that we'd expect. And then finally, we looked at the queuing, so stacks of cars waiting to get in and out of the roundabout. I think this is one of the main reasons that we are here doing this evaluation because of the concerns about queuing in 2009. So the longest queue was 12 cars on the Shelburne approach and I will say counting these cars that most cars, it only took them a few seconds to actually sit at the approach to the roundabout and get into it versus queues at a traffic signal, you're sitting and waiting for quite a bit longer. So queuing at roundabouts can feel a little bit different because you're actually moving. So we are definitely encouraged by this data, seems like a really successful traffic operation to have at this intersection. So we are also looking at crash data. We're gonna look at the pre five years before construction, actually we're choosing the five years before COVID and then we're looking at five years post construction. Overall, it's hard to discern patterns with just one year of data, but we did make it through the first year of the roundabout being open without any major crashes or incidents. So there were nine minor crashes in 2023 and no crashes involving bicycles or pedestrians or resulting in injuries or fatalities. So we also distributed a public survey in April of last year to ask people what they thought about the roundabout. The two questions we'll see here are how comfortable are you navigating the roundabout? And this graph really shows that drivers by far had an increase in comfort at this intersection. There was also an increase in comfort for people walking and then a bit more of a neutral response for bicyclists. We also asked people how has your comfort changed going through this intersection from its previous pre-construction state to now, which had a bit more of a positive response from people walking and biking, although still pretty neutral, especially for bicyclists, but still very positive for drivers. We also had an open ended section of our survey where we heard a lot of really positive input and also a few people who still seemed a little confused, not knowing how to drive through the roundabout or seeing other drivers who seemed confused. This is not super surprising. Like I said, it's the first roundabout in the entire county, so most people don't drive through these every day, but we are hoping over time people continue to get used to driving through the roundabout. So a couple of next steps for this evaluation, we will be collecting traffic and crash data annually until two years after the Champlain Parkway is completed. So whether that's 2026 or any other year, we'll be collecting this data until two years after the Parkway is completed. In addition, we plan to do another public survey on this timeline, it's 2027, but it would be one year after the Parkway is completed because that's when we expect to see some change in traffic pattern and want to make sure we are capturing what people think. I just, there's a really cool story map that VTrans made that kind of documents all the construction and changes at this intersection. If anyone's interested, I just put the link here. You can look at it on your own time. And with that, I'm happy to answer any questions or hear your comments. That's great, very exciting. Hard to believe it's been a year. We will go to questions and comments from the council if there are any, Councilor Hightower. Great, thank you all so much for presenting. I just have a question, and sorry if I was getting settled and missed some of this, but it seems like most of the data that we have is comparing what we expected the roundabout to do versus what it's doing. Did we have data on what was happening before we put in the roundabout? Just from thinking about where we don't want to do it in the future kind of question. There's a striking lack of data from before the roundabout was completed. Unfortunately, because I would love to compare. Also, the intersection doesn't necessarily have the same metrics before and after because the configuration was so different. So we're just comparing it to kind of best practice thresholds to see how it's doing. Okay, thank you. It is also worth noting that the project started as a scoping through the CCRPC. I think it's far back as 2002, and then its preferred alternative worked its way to the council after public outreach in 2009, had substantial design through 2014 to 2020 where then it really made progress to be able to go out to bid, so it is 20 years in the making and data from before, which was very much rooted in the fact that it's a high crash location or was a high crash location in the state and was consistently a high crash location throughout those times with serious injuries and by compared crashes reported. So that's really the only consistent data point that we have, we do wanna keep track of that. Great, thank you so much. Thanks, Councilor Hightower. If we could go back to the screen that has those that are participating so we can particularly see the city councilors that are joining us by Zoom. Are there any other councilors who have any questions or comments on this agenda item? Councilor Travers. Thanks very much for the presentation. Representing Ward 5, and as someone who drives through this roundabout every day, it's a fantastic improvement. So congratulations on all the excellent work. I think our late friend Tony Reddington would be proud. I have two questions that come up with constituents with some regularity and just thought I would run them by you all. The first is I know the internal apron that's within the roundabout is my understanding for the purpose of some vehicles that have a different turning radius to perhaps even go up on that apron to navigate that. I do think that sometimes during the winter, if the apron itself has not been plowed that folks can go up and over the apron leaving some tracks in the snow that leads to some confusion. Perhaps the plantings in the middle of the circle and some signage and so on will help to sort of end the practice of some folks that are not supposed to be using the apron to go around it utilizing that space. But just wondering if you have any sort of feedback on that that the extent to which that internal apron is using and have you found that sort of vehicles that don't need it for their turning radius have been using it when they should not be? The first season it was very prominent. I think we've been fortunate enough this year that there hasn't been a lot of snow. I haven't seen any reports come through RC Click Fix system of straight through movements during obscured conditions this season. But it is definitely something at post construction and post the very early snowstorms we had, we talked with our crews about the importance of keeping the apron clear. It is a secondary clearing to the primary routes throughout the town so depending on the severity of a snowstorm it would get cleared second. Other than that I think it's probably, V-Trans had done a video about how to navigate around about and it's probably worthwhile for us maybe ahead of snowstorms to republish that and promote that as well for our location. Great, thanks. I know this probably is not within the purview of your department but my understanding is that in the middle of the roundabout there was a platform that was placed there for the purpose of some future public art installation and just wondering if you can speak to it. Are there any ongoing discussions with respect to what would go there? There are ongoing discussions. BCA has been a little overwhelmed by all of DPW's projects, putting out a groundbreaking number of RFPs for public art with the downtown projects. I do know that they are still, they still have this one on their list. There is still funding set aside for it. I just don't know that they've had capacity to address it until A, it was fully turned over to us which happened this past season and B, also their staff capacity to manage. Great. It's planned. Thank you. Great, thank you so much, Councillor Travers. Seeing no one else, we will close out this, Councillor Bergman. Sorry, in terms of the statistics, the one statistic, one street that sticks out to me in a number of categories is Locust Street and that's obviously a connection down to Pine Street. I'm just curious, you haven't flagged that but it, and the numbers like on the queuing are not, I don't know that there are a lot to have for when the expectors were two, but if you're in a line of four and if you look at the, even the speed is a little bit faster, I don't, there's no comparison in terms of the average daily traffic vehicles and, but the peak volume is actually, you know, is the outlier there. So what's going on, do you think? Working in close proximity to the, the recently completed roundabout, I can personally attest that I find coming up Locust to be a lot more comfortable than it ever used to be when trying to reach my destination of getting to Shelvern Road or South Willard to use that as my connecting network versus using other local residential streets to get up there. So I think that for myself, the roundabout and the comfort and ease of use has unlocked that as a collector street, which is how it should be used. And I believe that the number of vehicles using that now are finding comfort in that approach. So the one comment I would make is you've got, in my day, it was South Park, now it's Callahan Park. It's been there for a long time. It's Callahan, you've got the school there. So that is something I think we need to pay really close attention of it's becoming an attractive through street given the nature of things such as parking on all of those side streets to get to the park or drop offs and kids walking and stuff. Yep, thank you. Thanks. Thanks very much, Councilor Bergman. If there is no one else, and it doesn't appear that there is, then we will close out this agenda item with our thanks to both of you for being here with us this evening. We do have a couple of minutes before public forum, so we'll skip ahead to item number five, which is climate emergency reports. Is there any Councilor or the administration who wishes to offer a climate emergency report? Councilor Bergman. I just wanna continue to briefly comment about the crazy weather that we have. We have had a snowstorm this last couple of days and the sky was exploding in the Mad River Valley because the transformers were shorted out and the sky was blue for much of Sunday morning. I think that it will do us well to be looking at our net zero roadmap and our climate action plan with particularity. And I'm thinking a lot on the solar capacity of new construction, which I think we have not focused as much as we should and on the transportation sector as well as on additional building decarbonization. We've had that debate here and I look forward to continuing that, but there's a lot of snow in the mountains right now. They're probably gonna have three feet of snow when all this is done in the last day. We don't really understand that here in the banana belt, but three feet of snow is gonna come down the Winooski River. Somebody in my neighborhood has told me I should not be gardening in the innervill. It's what feeds me for the entire year and has done so for like 35 years. And so that prospect is not good. So we really need to be continually focused on doing more because it is an emergency. Thank you. Thanks so much, Councilor Bergman. We will go to Mayor Weinberger. Thank you, President Paul. Actually following Council Bergman's points got kind of an exciting announcement about an element of what the administration has been working on. A lot of people know since 2016, we've had a data effort that we call BTB-STAT and we have just launched a new climate emergency dashboard so that Burlintonians can track current available data on a number of metrics related to the climate emergency, including average daily temperature, precipitation, lake ice, combined sewer overflows, phosphorus concentration in the lake and can also track our city's progress towards ambitious net zero energy goals. I'm pretty sure solar installed PV is one of the metrics that's on there. And it's really an area where we've excelled. We are for a number of years in the road now have been the only city east of the East Coast in the top five in terms of PV installed per capita. But we do have to keep this whole house to track the continued progress. I wanna, you can get to this data hub easily from the city's homepage, the website. There are a few striking metrics gathered by the team. I wanted to highlight here and this is really, I had not seen these numbers before. Burlinton's average temperatures have increased by 2.9 degrees Fahrenheit over the last 20 years, which is more than the statewide average. Winter temperatures have increased even faster. The average daily winter temperature is now 4.4 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than in the 20th century. From 1850 to 1918, the lake froze over completely every year. Since 2000, the lake has frozen over only eight out of the 23 years. And a final fact on average, there are 25 more days each year with a high temperature over 80 degrees Fahrenheit today than there were going back just the 1980s. So essentially an additional month of hot summer weather every year. Some progress about the city's advances towards net zero goals. The city fleet used 19% fewer gallons of fossil fuel in FY23 compared to FY18. BED, which is kind of leaving the way with electrification is down 32%. Since 2019, or sorry, in 2019, none of the city fleet vehicles purchased for electric vehicles. Sorry, I think that might not be quite right. I think we might have had a couple, but since 2020, we have added 25 electric vehicles in 16 hybrids and half of the vehicles purchased in 2023 were electric. And finally, in 2022, we announced, we released our last net zero road map progress report. It showed that the city of Burlington emitted 11% fewer greenhouse gas emissions than in 2018 in the ground, transportation and heating sectors. I don't have an update on that for you tonight, but we'll be for the end of the month. And we're hopeful that that will show additional progress. Final point, President Paul, earlier tonight, the Board of Finance approved a grant acceptance that will help BED transition more low-income residences away from fossil fuel-powered water heaters. The initial grant acceptance is for a half a million dollars in the new state program called Switch and Save, stems from an energy action network workgroup that is co-chairing by our own general manager, Darren Springer, during the 2022 legislative session. With these funds, BED will be able to help between 75 and 125 income qualified Burlingtonians to make the switch to electric heat pump water heaters. And of course, when people make the switch to electric here in Burlington, that means it'll be all powered by the 100% renewable energy. I'm so grateful to the tireless leadership of our BED team in developing these new equitable programs really focused not just on our progress towards net zero goals, but in doing so equitably. And this is a great example of that. Thank you, President Paul, for the chance to share all that. Great, thank you so much, Mayor Weinberger. And for those who are interested in the report and the agenda item that you just mentioned, it did pass the Board of Finance. It's also on our consent agenda is item 7.15. We are close enough to 7.30, so we will go back to item number four, which is the public forum. Before we begin public forum, I would like to note that we do have a process for public forum, and I speak for the full council as we share a strong commitment to an orderly process and one that honors all voices and respectful discourse. For those who are joining us in con toys, we have a timer system that's on the table in front of me. It has three lights on it. The first light, which is a green light, will shine when you begin speaking. The second yellow light, when you have 30 seconds left. And the last light is red, and that will shine when your time is up. Please complete your sentence when the sound and light indicate that your time is up so that we give everyone the same amount of time and we can keep the public forum moving along. If you're joining us by Zoom, we don't have a timer system, but we do have, but we don't have a timer system with lights, but we do have a timer system that will be set up for us. We don't, when your two minutes is up and the clock runs down to zero, please complete your sentence so that we can move on to the next community member. If you wish to speak in person, there are forms to my right in the back of the room. Please leave them on the table and we'll collect them. There are three different colors. So just make sure that you're signing up correctly. There are ones for Burlington residents. There are ones for Burlington property owners who do not live in Burlington. And then there are also ones for non-Burlington residents. It has been our practice that Burlington residents will have first priority to speak. We will go to Burlington residents who are joining us in con toys who have submitted this form, the blue form. Then we will go to Burlington residents who are joining us online. We will come back to Burlington property owners or representatives of Burlington based businesses and organizations that are joining us in person and back online. And we will finish up with non-Burlington residents joining us in con toys and then wrapping up with any non-Burlington residents who are joining us via Zoom. During public forum, we do ask that you please use respectful language. We would like to remind everyone here this evening and joining us online that there are families who watch our council meetings as their connection to civic engagement. Parents use this forum to teach our city's children about city government. And we expect that everyone will refrain from using profanity. Let's model the best in Burlington. Also request that when you are speaking that you face me and direct your comments to me as the chair and not to anyone else at this table nor to the audience that is gathered behind you. Please do not personalize your comments. This rule will be enforced. Again, we wanna hear what you have to say and it is much easier for us to listen more intently if you speak respectfully. With that, we will go first to those Burlington residents that are joining us in Contways. And the first speaker is Marianne Danes to be followed by Solvig Overby. You're welcome if you'd like to sit, both of you to sit here. You can certainly wait for the first speaker to be done and I will continue to call two at a time so that you know when you're in line to speak. That's okay, good evening. Good. And you just need to make sure that there's a light that's in front of you where it says push, that it's on so that the light is green in front of you. Sorry, new technology, that's quite all right. Thank you. My name is Marianne Danes. I have lived in Lakeside all my life, born, bred, married the boy down the street just to give you an idea. The reason why I'm here is not because of what's being discussed but many of my neighbors have just found out on Monday that there is a building that has been proposed and a reconstruction of another building and we are a historical neighborhood and it seems that that one particular interest is forgotten more times than I can count. Not only that, but like I said, we only found one of the neighbors happened to get an email or something pertaining to this and the word spread like wildfire this week. Nobody is happy with this. The land that they're talking about is an historical lot but I don't know much about some of the stuff but I know the zoning has not been passed. We like to know, a lot of us will really like to know why we used to get cards, little index cards saying hey, your neighbor's doing this or doing that. Well, that's not around any longer. It seems transparency has disappeared in Burlington at least for a lot of us and I don't know what meetings we need to go to straighten this out or what but if anybody has anything, my phone number's on the sheet please give me a yell and tell me what the hang to do because a lot of us are stumped. We don't know how this got through and I'm sorry, how this got through. So thank you very much. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Solvei Overby to be followed by Charles Messing. Good evening. Hello. For the record, my name is Solvei Overby and I have some notes that you actually have a written copy of but I'm gonna select some of the things to say to you from that. I am definitely here to speak to you against the resolution in item 8.2 on the Memorial Auditorium Pre-Development Agreement. Frankly, this agreement is actually it's just unacceptable first step to transferring the control of those three acres of really prime downtown Burlington municipal property without a bid process. I just don't see any impending crisis that this has to be all signed off on tonight or in the next month or two months. So the analogy that I would actually give is frankly, people have said it's not a binding thing we're just thinking about due diligence but in fact it really is like taking the engagement ring and then thinking maybe not you're gonna not go down the path and get the wedding ring. The pre-agreement is the engagement ring and the development agreement will be the wedding ring. So I'm just gonna make a quick comment on the second pages. In my documents that I've communicated with you guys, I've made you aware that there was a gateway RFP process underway that got derailed. So you have information about that and it's not showing up in your timeline on the mail that you got for this meeting. You were made aware that the actual property transfer arrangement is a bit ambiguous at this point. It's sort of a legal structure that is gonna be determined eventually. What looks like it was called an airspace condominium with options to transfer or sublease pad sites to other developers. I think more needs to be talked about about what that means so that the public understands what that is. You've also been made aware that the agreement requires the city to find a municipal property for a fire station or replacement and it commits to getting it all organized so they can actually build on that. And it's not like it's just hypothetical. We are committing to that. You're also made aware that the terms feasible and viable are in that document and they're not defined. The rest of my comments are available in that paper that I have provided with you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Charles Messing to be followed by Jane McDougall. Well, Charles is finding his way around the room. There is, these forms are all numbered, they're pre-numbered. We are skipping to the third speaker which is actually the fourth person to sign up. If there's anyone here who has number three, you're welcome to please bring it forward so that we can call on you. We are skipping a number which means somebody may have filled out number three and didn't hand it in. With that, we will go to Charles Messing to be followed by Jane McDougall. Good evening. Thank you. Actually, it's Charlie but it was paperwork and I've been filling out paperwork so I used that name. Hello everyone, thank you. Jane. Wish I could see you better. Hi Karen. Hi. I know all about microphones. I've been dealing with microphones for decades. I agree with Solvig about everything she says. I consider her the expert on every subject she brings up here. She is the expert as Tony Reddington was the roundabout expert. There's a plan for the memorial auditorium block, the gateway block, the parking lot block, whatever you call it. And there are these amendments which entail the possibility of taking down the auditorium even though almost everyone in town wants us to keep it. I suggest, if it's too beat up, building a replica in its place, elevator and all, right in its place with brick. Don't make it look ugly and modern. Make it look like memorial auditorium. It would be a wonderful thing for the city. And of course, the number one priority for older people, I am an older person. I live right downtown. It's fix all the sidewalks. Thank you. Thank you so much, Charlie. Our next speaker is Jane McDougal to be followed by Robert Bristow-Johnson. Good evening. Good evening ma'am, how are you? I'm good, how about you? Well, okay, I found it. Ma'am, I am directing this at you. What about the mono auditorium because I've been to that meeting when I lived on Pine Street? There was a women's council. It was built in 1950s because it was a, it was a during the World War II. And also, what about this housing deal about used, not built, used buildings being built, you know, taking old department stores and turning them into housing? I appreciate it, thank you. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Robert Bristow-Johnson to be followed by Kathleen Donahue. Good evening, Robert. So I just sent all of you an email because it's too late for the agenda packet. It was a nice day on Friday. I took my canoe out and I'm alarmed. Thank you. As much as anybody, I hate alarmism. People waste our bandwidth with the sky is falling. And the fact is that the bike bridge is not falling yet. But the erosion around the south pier has now exposed the pile, which is the very first primitive construction made. It was done 130 or something years ago when the railroad bridge was built in the 19th century. And that is exposed for the first time ever because of erosion that has happened from multiple water events first that I know of was Hurricane Irene. Then just last July there was the unnamed event last July and then another one on December 18th. Each time the lake rises two feet in about two or three days. That lake's 100 miles long. How does it do that? There's a lot of water coming down very few rivers. One of the main ones is the Winooski River. This pile that's now exposed now on two of three sides is going to be exposed in all four sides. And when that happens, there's serious trouble. I'm not a structural engineer, I'm an electrical engineer, but I know that there's gonna be trouble. It's gonna be, it's not gonna last 10 years, might not even last five years. This has to be taken seriously. Not one single level of government has done anything about this. I brought attention to the state government. I've been here before to bring it to your attention and I'm doing it now. We need to get to the department heads. Thank you so much. And bring this to their attention. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Kathleen Donahue to be followed by Scott Tobis. Good evening. Good evening. Hi, my name is Kathleen Donahue and I'm once again before you as a homeowner from Henry Street in Ward 1. I realize that a lot of time has been spent thoughtfully crafting a new zoning code for our city. And indeed, I appreciate the city's efforts to address the housing crisis. My first preference would be that you send the proposed neighborhood code back to committee to work out the many issues that have been brought forth from previous hearings and communications. I think that even more time invested at the front end would prevent unintended consequences down the road. However, I realize that as city leaders you feel compelled to act quickly to create housing now. So I would urge you to support the amendment proposed by Councillor Doherty that seeks to maintain low density in Ward 1 between North Willard and Mansfield Ave rather than double up zone it to medium density. Here's why. Ward 1 is diversely settled but uniquely vulnerable to the pressure and quality of life challenges of student rentals that give our proximity, given our proximity to campus. We already have the variety of housing that the neighborhood code seeks. However, if you double up zone our area you make it even more attractive to investors, developers who will buy existing homes or lots to create even more student rentals. This is just a fact. This disrupts the stability of the neighborhood, discourages family home ownership, creates a monoculture of predominantly student residents and goes against the idea of affordable diversified housing that the proposed codes sets out to create. Our area already experiences a precarious existence and by up zoning us to medium density will hasten the degradation of our neighborhood instead of creating the vibrant, diverse and livable community that you propose. Please consider the unique vulnerability of our Ward 1 neighborhood as you move forward with a vote in the coming weeks. Visit us, walk our streets and then support the amendment for low density in this area of Ward 1. Thank you for your time and your dedication to improving. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Scott Tobas to be followed by Kathy Allwell. Good evening. If you can just make sure that the microphone is working so that the green light in front of you is on where right above the Ward push. There may be one microphone that isn't working correctly. The green light is on? Yes, it is. You should be able to hear you just fine. Thank you. My name is Scott Tobias. I'm a Ward 1 resident. I've lived there for 25 years. I'm also as Kathleen here to talk about my support for Councilperson Doherty's amendment to the proposed up zoning of our Ward into a, from low density to medium density, a zoning change that would move us from current settlement patterns, a historic neighborhood into blocks of three-story apartments without separation between the houses and the structures. The process that has been undertaken to bring us to the point of this up zoning is appreciated. But the questions remain. We don't know how this process has been integrated with an overall look at housing in the city of Burlington, especially downtown in our higher density areas, looking at vacant businesses, vacancies in commercial properties, vagrant properties and abandoned properties. We don't know how this has been coordinated with the University of Vermont and its planned increase of three to 5,000 students. We don't know what is going to happen with impermeable areas that are going to add runoff to an already stressed waste water, combined waste water and storm water system. We don't know what's going to happen to parking, the addition of hundreds more cars that require parking spaces. For us, this is not an envy issue. This is an existential issue. And we see this turning into an enormous increase in our property taxes as our properties are valued up. And we ask the council to support, don't run off the dock and dive into murky water when you don't know how deep it is. Thank you. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Kathy Allwell to be followed by Romeo von Herrmann. Good evening, Kathy. Good evening. I guess I'm very frustrated with the whole process of the zoning. Potentials do a very inclusive and equitable plan for Burlington that would house the houseless, provide homes for the middle and working class families who are being squeezed out and affordable rental spaces for young singles and families who want to stay or move back to Burlington could have been done. But this doesn't happen in six months. With a very uninclusive process, it gives us what so far is a city code that has not looked at implications of what it really means to put eight to 10 units on a lot. On stormwater, runoff, older tree cover and other environmental implications. Two, it gets rid of all parking mandates which is good for the environment to get rid of cars, but there is no plan for public transportation improvements. Three, which builds more apartments and no improvement to what is dismal code enforcement, leaves many living in substandard housing because they cannot afford market rate. Four, which has no inclusionary zoning rules included which leaves low income folks at a disadvantage. And last but certainly not least, BTV, the state of Vermont and the federal funds of all three of these must be increased to fund more adequate section eight vouchers and there is no plan to do this either. I know you think I am pie in the sky, but I am not. Had we done a very inclusive process as was done in Minneapolis, we could have gotten a far better outcome. We don't always have to reinvent the wheel. But look other cities and towns and scale and adapt them to Burlington. So I just think I'm gonna say this very fast because I really want us to stay at low density and medium density, one upscale, up zone and nothing more and go back and do a very inclusive process as we do in Minneapolis. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Romy Ovan-Herman to be followed by Stephen Conant. Good evening. Good evening, Madam President. Madam President, Mr. Mayor, City Councilors, City Administrative Team, City Staff, fellow Burlingtonians and residents, I would like to start by recognizing that we are in the holy month of Ramadan and I want to wish everybody a happy, peaceful Ramadan to everyone here in Vermont and around the world. I also want to recognize the women's history month that we're in as well and I wish everyone well. I want to equally recognize the all who participated in this past town meeting day. Your engagement and passion and dedication to democracy is outstanding. As we embark on new chapter post town meeting day, it is essential that we come together to heal our city's many issues. Not more than ever, we must prioritize corporation, empathy, vigilance and understanding. Let us lose the sight of the challenges ahead of us and I mean local challenges. It is imperative that we maintain vigilance and proactiveness in addressing the many issues that we face and come together collaboratively. Simply put, Madam President, we are all on the same team. Thank you. Thank you so much. We'll now move on to Stephen Conant to be followed by Richard Hilliard. Good evening, Steve. Good evening. I'm Steve Conant, Ward 1. Thank you city counselors. Thank you planners for your hard work on the neighborhood code. I support it wholeheartedly. I fear however that as written part of Ward 1 will experience an irreversible consequence. The double up zoning of all of Ward 1 from residential low past the new residential low to the new residential hot medium will further the trend toward a student populated in monoculture that's been developing for decades. This trend was recognized eight years ago in the 2015 draft housing action plan which states, quote, the lack of sufficient housing has exacerbated quality of life issues in the city's historic neighborhoods particularly near the University of Vermont and Champlain College. Students are competing with residents for rental units and the volume of demand encourages some landlords to allow quality of their housing units to deteriorate. Demand has only increased in the six years since that 2015 housing plan. I'll quote, it says on page eight, section one, aspires to quote, over the next five years create approximately 1500 new well managed student housing beds on campus and in the downtown to create a better balance in our community. Meeting this goal will reduce the number of students living off campus in Burlington's historic neighborhoods by approximately 50% and restore a better balance to many of those neighborhoods. A vibrant, healthy neighborhood in a livable city supports a balanced mix of residents. As the ratio of student units in Ward 1 has increased, that balance has been lost. Changing all of Ward 1 to residential medium will only add gas to the fire. Please avoid some of the irreversible consequences of this by approving city councilor Dority's amendment. Thank you. Thanks very much. Our next speaker is Richard Hilliard to be followed by Catherine Nielsen. Good evening. Good evening. Thank you. Just some bullets about our neighborhood code. 100% endorse all the testimony in your packet from Karen Long, Michael Long and other speakers. So I won't try to avoid going over them. I urge you to follow their advice in postponing any decision on neighborhood code until points raised can be fully considered by planning and the new administration and the new city council. No one from the so-called North Hill section of Ward 1 has said our neighborhood should not be affected by any zoning change, as you've just heard. Just our fair share, shared by other neighborhoods around the city. Perhaps others and nimbies, but we are not and it's grossly unfair to characterize as such. The impact of proposed developments by UVM will already be overwhelming and transformative to Ward 1. Although I see now that the state ordered to us now, I did some concerns about that. Hopefully Karen Long's letter has adequately responded to Councilor Trout versus comment a couple of weeks ago about Ward 1's engagement with public comment. We have only, that includes city councilors, been aware of these changes for six weeks. Finally, I have a page. Exhibit. From the city's 1996 municipal plan, which has a picture of my home. One reason that made our neighborhood attractive to live in when we relocated is that our neighborhood, as, and I quote, the essence of the city's sense of community. It suggested nothing about the city being about this street being one of a number of sacrificial lands to essentially be used unwittingly adorned to UVM's campus. I can't be here when Council votes on this, but I implore all of you, the city council, to vote for postponement when you convene in two weeks. Great. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Catherine Nielsen to be followed by Christopher Aaron Felger. Good evening. Kathy Nielsen and Ward 1, Wilson Street. And I'm speaking for a number of neighbors as well. I wish to applaud the city councilors for addressing Burlington's housing crisis head on. I've read information and attended multiple meetings since I heard about neighborhood code four weeks ago, and I share your goals of creating affordable and quality housing for individuals and families and promoting paths to home ownership while maintaining healthy neighborhoods. My husband and I began renting in Burlington in the 1970s, and we have lived in at least five apartments. All of those units were owned by absentee landlords who had little concern about either the neighborhood or the health of our entire city. Our experience has led us to the conclusion that replacing single-family houses with a large number of units, many designed for college students and run by absentee landlords is not the answer to our problems. We can adopt a smaller scale and still meet our goals. The current zoning proposal was finalized at the end of January, a month and a half ago. I learned about it mid-February, and I've spoken to many people in the past two weeks who are just learning about this issue now. A proposal as complex and wide-ranging as the neighborhood code needs to be understood by the people it will affect. It is clear that there is tremendous pressure to pass the neighborhood code quickly and without changes. Though pressure comes from a variety of sources, it is far more important to get this right now. Resisting this pressure will be difficult, but I ask you to take the extra weeks to update the neighborhood code so that it serves our city well. Some have said add amendments later, but suggesting that important amendments could and would be passed once construction begins is disingenuous. Now is the time to get it right. I ask that you pay special attention to the following issues that have not been addressed. Parking, runoff, adequate green space, architectural compatibility, confirmation of virtual mapping data, and especially affordable housing. None of the units are designated as affordable. I respectfully ask this council to delay adoption of the neighborhood code until the public is better informed and the issues are addressed. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Christopher Aaron Felker to be followed by Ron Wanamaker. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Christopher Aaron Felker. I'm the chairman of the Burlington Public Party. I'm here tonight to speak on a couple of issues. I am a supporter of the neighborhood code and I appreciate the steps that this council has taken to attempt to address our housing crisis that Burlington has been facing for quite some time. I also would like to say that I echo Olbeg's comments earlier about concerns regarding the redevelopment of the Memorial Auditorium area. And I'm sure she put forward a proper presentation on that. I'm here tonight to express concerns regarding agenda item 8.1. Sorry, 8.4, updating inclusionary zoning and payment in lieu. Inclusionary zoning while well-intentioned is partially responsible for the housing crisis, the affordability and lack of housing that we have in Burlington today. For those of you who are at home who are not sure, when a building is required to have 20% affordable units, the other 80% of those units have to pick up the cost and actually subsidize them. This drives up the market rate value, making housing less affordable in town. The payment in lieu of system is nothing more than a tax on new development. And members of this council are attempting to more than double that. This is a poison pill that is intended to sabotage new development in Burlington, forcing developers into the inclusionary zoning of 20% subsidized units. This will make our housing situation worse and not better in town. I ask you to please don't support 8.4 and the increase in tax penalties on new development. Thank you. Thanks very much. So our next speaker is Ron Wanamaker to be followed by Lisa Reinman. Good evening, Ron. Just make sure you get close to the microphone. Even though there's so much to talk about, I think 8.2 and the Memorial Block and the Gateway project, I just, assuming that it's most likely gonna pass, I just think that a lot of things need to be considered by the city council. I mean, we've had Burlington telecom, we've had the pit, we've had the language is disturbing in the agreement that you guys are gonna vote on tonight. Notably, the provision doesn't provide for the city to withdraw, even though it provides for the developers to withdraw if it's not financially feasible. Paragraph 2E says the city does not guarantee the project will proceed beyond the due diligence phase and paragraph seven states project will require city council authorization. You guys, but Ken, the mayor vetoed that. There's a lot of details that are left out of the current language. I think mostly our Burlington residents on the, would we have to reimburse the developer for its due diligence expenditures? So if they spend the next year or however long doing their due diligence and then we decide to not go with that project, are we responsible for those costs? These are just some of the questions that are, I think need to be addressed. So I would ask that the council table or vote against this as proposed. And then of course the greatest thing is the memorial auditorium. The entire document makes you the supposition that the memorial auditorium will be demolished. There's not, it's not stated as a goal or a requirement. And I think that the very least we should ask that the document required as a goal for the city that we retain memorial auditorium. Thank you for your time. Thank you very much. How was that? I think pretty good, right? It was excellent, excellent. So our next speaker is Lisa Reiman to be followed by Matthew Viennes. Good evening. Hi, I'm Lisa Reiman. I'm award seven resident and I'm also here to represent Preservation Burlington. So I'm here to speak about 8.2, also the memorial gateway block. And I believe that the agreement before you needs to be rejected as written and given more consideration and discussion. Specifically, I would like to see that the terms feasible and viable I defined for both sides. I would like to see that equal access and opportunity is given to other development ideas and developers. I would like to see that the city has the same out of the agreement as the developer. And I'd like to really ensure that the character of the block is preserved. This doesn't mean we at Preservation Burlington know I in particular are anti-development or anti-developer. I'm not, I'm a realist. I know that we need to have change and I know we need to do something with this block. But I would like to stop this incremental erosion of our historic fabric that we are seeing. We are losing buildings one by one by one and it is completely changing Burlington. I would like to ensure that the same consideration for retention and reuse is given to Memorial Auditorium as it is to Central Fire Station. They're both by the same architect. They're both absolutely character defining for that block and they are really important buildings. I'd like to make sure also that the fire department is part of the relocation conversation. And finally, as a voter who approved the $1 million bond for the stabilization of Memorial Auditorium, I would like a full accounting of where that money went. I've heard that up to 800,000 of that may have been spent on relocating telecom equipment out of the basement. This is not what we voted for and that is not stabilization of the building by any stretch of the imagination. I know you, Councilor Powell, have been trying to answer my questions and I thank you for that. It's not an easy task and I look forward to your final accounting, but I would like to see where that money went. Thank you. Thanks very much. The next speaker is Matthew Viennes. Viennes and to be followed by Michael Long and then Karen Long. Good evening. Good evening. I'm here. My name is Matthew Viennes. I'm a resident of Ward 6. Live on St. Paul Street and thank you for allowing us to speak with you this evening. I'm here to ask that the Council vote against the resolution authorizing the mayor to execute the pre-development agreement with the two developers around the redevelopment of the memorial block. There are two historic structures on this block. The memorial auditorium is on the national register. It was built in 1927 to memorialize veterans from World War I. The fire station was built in 1926 and was designed by the same architect as memorial auditorium. Both structures stand as symbols of their time of Burlington civic pride and represent an architectural period in the history of our city that is fast disappearing. Whatever development agreement is struck for the redevelopment of this block, it should include as a prerequisite that these two structures be retained. I fear that Burlington has not learned the lesson of urban renewal. A disastrous time for our city when historic structures and aspects of our cultural diversity, our neighborhoods were stripped away in the name of progress, only to be replaced by architectural eyesores that have not proven the test of time. There is more than adequate space on this block to achieve the goals of allowing redevelopment, adding additional housing, and to save these two historic properties. And I urge the council to vote against the resolution. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Michael Long, to be followed by Karen Long. Good evening. Good evening. Despite noble intentions, neighborhood code is an unfinished work in progress and should be returned to committee to get it right. At present, it pursues extreme density come what may. It does not yet address stormwater, parking demand, off-campus student housing pressure, flawed mapping data, or even the affordability that's purportedly at central concern. It relies on market forces that have proven unreliable and resulted in high priced and poorly maintained units in formerly diverse neighborhoods. When neighborhood code is finished and ready to advance, the goal of more affordable quality housing, it will not double up zone a missing middle neighborhood like the one between Willard and Mansfield. That neighborhood currently is 60% single family houses, about 20% duplexes and 20% triplexes, fourplexes, and larger buildings. This is a healthy dense diverse neighborhood now. Double up zoning and hyper density would push it toward monoculture and absentee investor ownership instead. When neighborhood code is finished and ready, it will not permit eight or 10 units on any lot. Like the many states and localities that have up zoned in recent years, it will permit two, three or four units. A significant density increase like this would be exactly what we were told neighborhood code would lead to. That's exactly what the planning department said at the October NPA, duplexes, triplexes, and fourplexes. No mention was made of eight or 10 units on a lot at the NPA in October, November, or December. And as late as February, we were told in writing that a lot in the RL zone could have four dwelling units on it. When neighborhood code is ready, you should be voting on three or four units just as people were told. Not the unmentioned eight or 10. Thank you. Thank you very much. So our next speaker is Karen Long to be followed by Thomas Lamson. Hi. Hi. So first of all, please do not move forward on, I still love the gateway block, but you're calling it now the memorial block. It's not ready. And everything is being rushed through. So please, and I hope you don't have another midnight meeting tonight like you've had the last few council meetings. But I did come to speak about neighborhood code. I did a little more research at the end, Michael already said about what we've been told. I also looked up from the 220 meeting with Megan and she showed a map of the different areas of the city. Some will be some to grow, some to sustain, and some to, sorry, I'm losing my parts here, but basically my neighborhood between Willard and Mansfield was set aside to sustain. And because of what they've said about the pressure of the student housing. And in here, so then I go back to BTV. We all participated in plan BTV. On page 91, it says here that parts of the community will have small and incremental change that is consistent with the existing development pattern, building scale and neighborhood character. Eight to 10 units is not consistent. And it will be student rentals. And if any of you know me since like 1997, I helped get code enforcement office because we had no office. And I have been a big fighter for tenant rights, clean, safe apartments. And if we allow this and have 10 units on small lots, we will not have nice, safe, healthy housing. So we will not have safe, healthy people. Thank you. Thank you so much. Our last speaker who is joining us in Contways is Thomas Lamson. Good evening. Good evening. I'm an award six resident. And I wanted to speak a little bit about the gateway block. Concern is that this is a city property that we're, we have an opportunity to develop, to give away to developers or to address some of the basic problems we've got in this city. And I'm speaking of the drug problem, the public distal water problem and addiction issues that are the sort of the sleeping giant that no one's talking about. And I think that we need to address these quality of life issues. And we have an opportunity to do it as we redevelop this part of the city. And my thoughts on that are that we could be a leader in addressing the homeless issue and the drug issues and provide some affordable housing at the same time. And I think housing for the homeless. And I think this area could be developed as sort of a village where we provided services for people. The homeless people are not gonna go away. I think the numbers are only gonna increase. And I think we have an opportunity to create a gateway to the city that is in effect a village that is providing services, accountability. For example, in restoring these historic buildings, we could preserve them, but at the same time provide space for offices, for things like a justice center, for community policing. And have a village where we were on site providing services for people that are creating issues for our state. Thank you very much. Thank you, thanks so much. So we do have a couple of people that are joining us by Zoom and we will put up a timer on the screen. And the first person, these are Burlington residents, the first person is Sharon Busher. And Sharon, I have found you and enabled your microphone, you should be able to speak now. Thank you. Good evening. I'm gonna speak briefly on the Memorial Block. I agree with the comments that were made in public form regarding having in the pre-development agreement a goal to preserve Memorial Auditorium. The second piece about Memorial is, and I sent it to Councillor Bergman and Councillor Travers, that public engagement needs to be beefed up. It doesn't need to be a box that you just check off, but you really need to engage the public. And I'd like to see a kickoff meeting in con toys dedicated to the Memorial Block like we did for City Place and allow some of the great ideas that are coming forward to be shared with Eric and Joe. And they can take them or not, but it would be nice to have the creativity of Burlington added to this in the beginning and not at the end of the process. Now I'm gonna switch to the neighborhood code. I've written to all of you a lot about this and I'm not sure. I feel like I worry that maybe I've said too much, but I need to say this again. I really feel that what I have proposed is consistent with what was initiated. RL should have four units. You could have two duplexes, our M6 and units, if indeed one or two are affordable. And if you have smaller numbers per parcel, you probably will get different size units so that you would have a mix, a healthy mix. Some for single, some for two people and some for families. And NPR did a statement. The state of Vermont is saying we need to attract families and this proposal does nothing to do that. So thank you. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Diane Fryhite. And Diane, I have found you and enabled your microphone. You should be able to speak now if you just unmute on your side. Thank you, counselor. You made a mistake there. Diane, my apologies. I think I may have disabled your ability to speak. You should be able to speak now if you just unmute on your side. Okay. There you go. Thank you. Sure, please go ahead. Thank you, counselor. My name is Diane Fryhite and I'm a 35-year resident of the Lakeside neighborhood. I'm a former housing administrator and economic development director in Winooski. And my husband and I are dedicated and involved landlords in Burlington. And we're committed to providing affordable rental housing. I'm taking this opportunity to speak on behalf of my Lakeside neighbors who will be sending a communication to Counselor Tratterson Shannon in the near future. I'm gonna read some excerpts loosely and try and get through this quickly. You will not hear all of this. But as both owners and renters in the Lakeside neighborhood, we are requesting that the proposed neighborhood code be referred to the Burlington Ordinance Committee for careful reevaluation. And we ask that specific attention be paid to the Lakeside neighborhood. We believe there needs to be more research and careful attention paid to the unique impacts that doubling lot coverage would have in our neighborhood. Wet basements and flooded yards are commonplace in Lakeside due to the clay, the underlying clay soil. Erosion to the shoreline has been a problem for generations on this waterfront property as well, due in part to these conditions. And we believe that major impacts review for drainage and stormwater runoff is important to perform when considering this magnitude of lot coverage, increase in vulnerable late neighborhoods. We already have existing problems with street parking in our mixed-use neighborhood, which would be greatly exacerbated by doubling density without consideration for off-street parking. This will undoubtedly have a significant negative effect on our residents who already often have to circle a neighborhood to find a place to park. If developers continue to increase density without accommodation for parking, we truly don't know what will happen. We refer, we ask that you refer the neighborhood code to the ordinance committee for thoughtful consideration. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks so much. Our next speaker is Gordon Dragoon. And Gordon, I have found you and enabled your microphone. You should be able to speak. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Please go ahead. Hi there, my name is Gordon Dragoon and I'm a resident of Ward 4. I wasn't originally going to speak to the neighborhood code tonight as it wasn't on the docket, but I was listening in and felt the need to weigh in. Our housing crisis is of direct consequence to not building nearly enough over the last 40 years. If we'd like to solve the housing crisis, the only solution is to allow our city to continue to evolve. The alternative to development is stagnation and our housing crisis right now shows me that is exactly what Burlington has done in the last 40 years on the housing front with an incredibly unhealthy rental vacancy rate of 1.4%. We desperately need new development in order to make Burlington more affordable. Studies show that development today, unit fits sadly, generally doesn't go to lower income residents, decreases the cost of rental units city-wide. I agree that the impact should be spread equitably through the city. And as such, I support the city being zoned as RM city-wide. This could come in tandem with a decrease in lot coverage requirements in order to offset the issues that some have as stormwater. I disagree with the assessment that anything but single family housing is going to ruin our community. And I think such attitudes are rooted in classism. I've lived in Burlington for 14 years and I have only just been able to afford a home in the last year. I was only able to afford this home because of an assortment of advantages that I have that others do not. And it still was not easy. The only way that young people like myself are going to have a chance at owning a home is by increasing the housing stock. We've tried everything else over the last 40 years and it hasn't worked. And I think it's time we tried this. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. And I would just once again remind people that we're not here to impugn the motives of others to speak to the issue that you wish to support or the issue that you are against without doing that. The next speaker is Colin Larson. And Colin, I have enabled your microphone. You should be able to speak if you just unmute on your end. Hey, can you hear me? Yes, we can. Hi, yeah. I'm Colin Larson living Ward 7. Just a quick things on neighborhood code. There's an amendment present now that both unifies the RM and RL zones together. So we only have like three residential zones total which would be corridor high and this new zone simultaneously reduces lot coverage to 50% number of units in the primary building to five. So this is an attempt at like a compromise unification amendment for all of the things that have been expressed. I hope you would consider supporting it. And then just to address a couple of other things that have come up. So our inclusionary zoning ordinance as I understand it activates when five units or more are built. So I think the claim that none of the projects built under neighborhood code would create affordable units is not accurate. Technically, if you want more affordable units under our inclusionary zoning you need to just build more units period. So the best way to build affordable units under the system we have now is to build a lot more units otherwise. And then I agree that stormwater management is a problem that needs to be addressed in the climate resilient future. That said, during the joint committee process there was a lot of concern about scope creep of the neighborhood code and how many extra things could be added into the process and still come out with legislation in a timely manner. So that's why I think that sending this back to committee is just it's really gonna bog us down and we already have a statutory requirement due to the home bill at the state level to reform our zoning code to allow quadplexes on every lot. So that like that's the bare minimum we have to do and we're already overdue on that. Thank you. Thank you very much. And our last speaker joining us online who is a Burlington resident is Todd Schlossberg. And Todd, I have found you and enabled your microphone. You should be able to speak if you just on mute on your end. Okay, thank you, President Paul. Yes, you're ahead, please. I'd just like to speak briefly as I can on the neighborhood code issue. I appreciate hearing some of the last speakers here and acknowledging that stormwater is an issue. I hope we don't denigrate science to refer to the concern about stormwater as scope creep. I moved here in 1981. I live in Ward one. And we didn't have stormwater overwhelming our sewerage plants, our sewer treatment facilities at that time. We don't have adequate resources right now for managing the stormwater for our existing needs. So any responsible increase in density of lots has to at least take a scientific look at the impacts. It's that simple. I will say this, whatever you all do, I don't think in good conscience and really responsibly, a neighborhood code canner should be passed that does not share the burdens equitably across the city. There should be no privilege, no protections, no exemptions for the widest and wealthiest communities. And that is not to meant to be that I am denigrating anyone, city councillors. It's not, if the housing crisis is something that we all agree needs to be dealt with, then it is the height of nimbyism for some of our awards and neighborhoods to not take the same level of responsibility and accountability for this. If we're gonna up zone across in significant parts of the city, let's make it fair. Let's make it equitable. And I happen to agree that if we're gonna, if we take care of the other concerns, including stormwater, including student housing, not predominant when this is allowed, then we should have a single medium level and then a high level and a medium level should be citywide and every city council should have to support that and get the item from the residents. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. So we have one other person who is a non-Berlington resident who is joining us online. That is Karen Sita and I don't see you on, don't see you on Zoom. I do not see you joining us on Zoom. So with that, we will close the public forum at 8.30. Just wanted to mention to those people who are here for, who spoke to or are here for the neighborhood code. So the neighborhood code is not on the agenda this evening. I was gonna mention this later, but I'll mention it now because many of you are here and listening. If you, and this is also for all counselors as well, there are amendments to the neighborhood code that were posted on the city website. And they did meet the statutory deadline of Friday, March 9th, which was a couple of days ago. There are six amendments and one that is a hybrid of three amendments. So in essence, there are seven amendments. They're posted on this webpage. If you go to BurlingtonVT.gov and then DPI, which is Department of Permanent and Inspections, DPI, forward slash CDO, which is the Comprehensive Development Ordinance, and then forward slash amendments. So it's BurlingtonVT.gov forward slash DPI forward slash CDO forward slash amendments. You will be able to view all of them. They are all listed there. And I would certainly, this will be done in anticipation of the second public hearing that will be held on March 25th at our next council meeting. So with that, we will close the public floor. We actually did that. So that moves us on to item number six, which is the Public Health and Safety Emergency Reports. Is there any counselor or the administration who wishes to offer a public health and safety emergency report? And I will also acknowledge that we have counselor Shannon, counselor Jang, and counselor King that are all joining us by Zoom. Counselor Grant. Thank you. So I spent some time at Decker Towers, not this past Friday, but the Friday before. I was there for about two and a half hours, counselor McGee, we had a little bit of overlap that he had arrived earlier. And we were just observing what was going on in the evening. Also overheard a phone call as an example of some of the difficulties of getting the police department to help remove someone who's trespassed from the building if they've been invited into the building by a resident. So that was some very interesting kind of live feedback of some of the problems that are occurring there. One of the updates we can provide is the council was notified that the sheriff's department would be doing sweeps in the building. They're also working on trying to hire security and a few other things. There is going to be a meeting of the BHA Religion Housing Authority Board. It's actually happening tomorrow to kind of get an update on how these things are going. So hopefully by the next city council meeting we'll have more of an update of what's happening in the building. I also plan to talk to the residents personally to hear from them what they are feeling. A quick update with regards to the Chittenden State's Attorney's Office, total pending cases as of March 1st or 3,052. The court system is now starting to provide some interesting details with regards to total number of cases filed by the office and that would be 220, which would include 41 felonies. We are looking at about 961 cases that are past what's called the disposition goal, i.e. having been fully resolved for lack of a better word. That has remained steady. I just want to continue to provide these numbers to let people know when we hear this narrative that the state's attorney's office isn't doing anything, that's not correct. Their case load is far above any other state's attorneys in the state. So I also want to start to include this data with the Public Safety Committee meeting because we haven't done that. We've got the information via email, but that would be included with the police chief's report as well as the fire chief's report. And we can just add it there where it can be viewed and you can see the comparisons between Chittenden counties and other counties. And that is all I had for tonight, thank you. Great, thanks so much, Councilor Grant. Again, if we could have the screen showing all of the people that are participating, that would help me being able to recognize people. And I also wanted to mention and I mentioned that we have Councilor Jang, Shannon, and King joining us by Zoom. We also have Mayor Weinberger joining us remotely. Are there any others who wish to offer a public health and safety emergency report? Seeing none, we will close out that item. And we do have one other meeting that we need to attend to this evening. That is the Local Control Commission. So we will recess the Council meeting at 8.36 and call to order the Local Control Commission at the same time. The first item on the agenda is item 1.01, a motion to adopt the agenda. We do have two members of the license committee who are joining us in con toys. That's Councilor Travers and Councilor Grant. I move to adopt the agenda. Thank you very much. Seconded. Seconded by Councilor Grant. Is there any discussion on the agenda? Seeing none, all those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Thank you. Any opposed, please say no. So we have our agenda. We have two items on our deliberative agenda. The first is 3.1, a first and third class liquor license application for Church Street Tavern. Commissioner Travers. I move to approve the 2024, 25, first and third class liquor license applications for Church Street Tavern 103 Church Street contingent upon fire marshal approval with all standard conditions. Thank you. Seconded by Councilor Grant. Thank you. Any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all those in favor of the motion is made by Commissioner Travers. Please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. That motion passes. And then we have one last item, which is 3.2, an outside consumption permit application for Church Street Tavern. Commissioner Travers. Move to approve the 2024, 25, outside consumption permit application for Church Street Tavern 103 Church Street. Second. Seconded by Commissioner Grant. Is there any discussion on that motion? Seeing none, all those in favor of the motion is made by Commissioner Travers. Please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. That motion passes. And with no other business and seeing no objection, we will adjourn the local control commission meeting at 8.39 and reconvene the council meeting at the same time. I failed to also acknowledge that with the departure of our acting city attorney, Jared Pellerin, we are very fortunate to have with us a past city attorney who is assisting us. A bit of a blast from the past has returned. Welcome so much, welcome very much to Joe McNeil, our former city attorney, who is assisting the city and the administrative transition. Thank you for being here. Even before April 1st, we are very grateful to have you and lucky to have you here. That will move us on to our consent agenda, which is item number seven. Is there a motion to move our consent agenda as amended and take the actions indicated? So moved. Thank you. Oh, thank you, Councillor McGee. Is there a second to that motion seconded by Councillor Barlow? Is there any discussion on that motion? Seeing none, all those in favor of the motion to approve our consent agenda, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. We have approved our consent agenda, which brings us to our deliberative agenda. We have six items on our deliberative agenda with the last two being placed on consent as per our motion to amend our agenda. Just a gentle reminder regarding the five minute rule, please self monitor and be mindful of your time and I will kindly interrupt you if your time is drawing near and ask you to wrap up so that we can be fair and respectful of all Councillors' time. The first item on our deliberative agenda is 8.1, which is the Church Street Marketplace Commission annual report for fiscal year 2023. And for this report, we have the chair of the Church Street Marketplace Commission, Mark Bouchette, as well as the vice chair. Yes, we're only a member of the committee. We actually have several members of the committee who are of the commission who are joining us. Thank you all for being here. And if there's more of you, by all means, Mark, introduce everyone. Thank you so much for being here. I'm sorry, what? I said they clearly felt I needed some support. Well, we're glad that you're here. If you wish to make some comments on the report that you've given to us, that's fine and then we'll go to questions and comments from the council. And also want to acknowledge that the director of the Downtown and Workforce Development Car Al-Nazwari is also joining us. Yeah, if it's all right, I would like to make sure a quick comment. And just make sure that you get close to the microphone. There we go. The report covers the majority of the events hosted and managed by the marketplace. But I did notice as I was getting ready to sit down tonight that we had left off an important one, which was sidewalk sale. And I just want to say that that's a great chance for shops to come out onto the street and for residents to take advantage of great values to support their local merchants. And I also wanted to say that the commission is really impressed with the work and dedication of the marketplace staff. They're the primary contact point for all the stakeholders in the street and are responsible then to go and do the work to manage and program the marketplace. And I really want to take a special moment out to single out Jim Daly and his crew for some special attention. I know fee payers on the marketplace are incredibly grateful for the work that he and his maintenance team do. I'm not just referring to the regular expectations of their job, which would be enough, but rather to the social work they perform almost every morning and the additional cleaning that entails and all the while treating people with just an incredible respect and dignity that Berlin Tonians, I think, should be very proud of. And I wanted to take a moment to thank director Alaswari and Senator Leahy for their efforts to secure funds to do some of the much needed brickwork and help move us into ADA compliance that's coming up this summer. Thank you, thanks so much. And also wanted to acknowledge, we do have two members of your commission, Becky Holt and also Romeo Von Herman. Thank you both very much for being here. If there are questions or comments from the council, and I'll try to pay attention to those that are joining us by Zoom as well, including the mayor. Are there any? Councillor Barlow. Thank you, President Paul. I was struck by the challenges that you outlined in your report. And we're all aware of the issues in the downtown. I'm just wondering what the commission has done in terms of trying to remedy to that, how you've approached that. Sure. You can speak a little bit about it. Yeah, I mean, it's an interesting point. As these issues came to, I mean, obviously we see them, but also as the issues came to us from our fee payers and from visitors to the marketplace, calling the marketplace and talking about the things that they're seeing, we discussed quite a bit about what our, you know, what can we do? What's our role? And we really view our primary role as programming and making the marketplace a delightful place for people to visit. Programming being one of the primary things that we seek to do to sort of you know, we think that if the marketplace is activated that it, that those things that are perceived and things that are real take a, you know, they're much less impactful if the marketplace is well programmed and activated as much as we possibly can. So that's, that was how we thought about it. We don't, and as well as passing on those comments that we get and concerns from fee payers onto you guys and to the mayor via, for example, the recent safety and security resolution that we shared with you. So we look at that as kind of our role. We're not, you know, we hope that when people come to the marketplace they observe the laws and ordinances that are, you know, passed by the city and for the marketplace in particular. But it's not our job to enforce them. You know, that's the Burlington Police Department with the guidance of the mayor and the city council to do that. But we're trying to use every, all the other tools that we have which are really programming, sort of keeping the street clean and doing what we can to sort of help folks out there. That's really more of our role and how we view it. Okay, thanks. Thanks so much, Councillor Barlow. Are there any other councillors, Councillor Grant? Thank you. So I spent a lot of time downtown. I have had some discussions with a lot of business owners and former, former chair, Mr. Nick. I had a long walk with him. Gosh, is it almost two years ago? I'm not even quite sure. It is Kara shaking her head. Yes, so Kara was there. We had a very long discussion and I still feel some of the things I brought up were relevant. Things that I have seen that have improved is a signage on the street and in the parks because there was a lot of complaining about specific behaviors that were occurring except for there was no signage and there was a desire to have our police officers taking liquor away from people hanging out in the park and I had a lot of issues with that because you couldn't assume really what people were gonna be doing in a few hours and you couldn't, it wasn't an appropriate thing for our police officers to be doing. So there were some things that were being asked of our police officers that I did not think were at the time appropriate. And I was also concerned about the lack of understanding of the root causes of what was happening. For example, sometimes I would be told that yeah, you just gotta move these people and I was like, move them where, right? And sometimes it's difficult to hear those comments from people who don't live in the city. You don't live in the city, you don't understand that these people are part of our city and we just can't move them. So there was a little bit of insensitive, combination of insensitivity and the lack of understanding about what was happening. I feel now more business owners have a better understanding of what was happening but that was missing in the beginning and I think in an attempt to get more help for increasing activities such as the open drug dealing, there is this tendency, hey, if we talk to the media then someone's gonna do something and try it as I may, I couldn't get people to stop doing that. And so that led to this whole perception thing and I know that The Rake did an article, I believe last December. I didn't agree with everything in it but there was some valid points where we were our own worst enemy with regards to how we talked about our city because it was red meat to the media even though things that are happening here are happening across Vermont. So I guess going into this new year, increased programming because the more programming you can do, the better off a church street marketplace and City Hall Park is. I think programming from church street marketplace from BCA and others has really made a difference with regards to what happens in the park. And I think also be conscious about how you communicate what you need. Don't go to the media to communicate what you need. It will have unintended results. Talk to your city counselors, talk to the mayor. Hopefully we can get better plans from our police department. That's always been a concern of mine that I've talked about repeatedly. We don't have a street crimes unit right now due to the lack of staffing that's really affecting all the open dealing that we've been seeing. If people haven't seen the October 10th presentation from the drug crimes unit, even though it was done way back in October, it's still relevant to today. So just wanted to mention those things. Appreciate your time. Thank you. Thank you very much, Councilor Grant. Councilor Jang, did you wish to be recognized? Go ahead. Thank you, President Paul. And thank you, commissioners, for your presentation. I think you have the most amazing job in the city of Burlington and in the state of Vermont because the city of Burlington is basically the economic vitality of the state of Vermont. And I know we all believe that. You guys are doing a great job. Thank you for this report. I have three questions. And the first one is around the hard and necessary work that Councilor Paul has done in reaching out to the Parmolore family to identify some funding and in collaboration with the city. I believe that the commission and also the department was provided with some resources to look into security, I believe, signage and was just wondering if you can talk a little bit about the impact that it had, whether or not it had any impact at all. Yeah, as a first question. Hi, yes. Approximately, I believe 50% of the funds on street level security, private security, that took us through the holiday season and into the beginning of the new year that has now been suspended because as we see probably mostly due to weather changes, we don't have as many pedestrian visitors to the marketplace right now. So we have set aside funds to address private security in the spring, should we need it, as well as we're developing a marketing campaign to sort of go back to some of the issues that Councilor Grant had mentioned before about perception. And the reason we're spending the funds in that manner is the result of a survey that we put out to the businesses and how they requested we spend the funds. So the top two items were private security and marketing. So while they're not fully expended yet, they are earmarked, so to speak, for both of those activities. Thank you. And this answer also led to my second question about City Hall Park. And was just wondering if you can speak a little bit about the plan for the spring and also to be ahead of a little bit about issues that may come during the spring when the weather gets a little bit better. What is the plan of both the department and the commission to plan effectively in making sure that everyone will feel safe around City Hall Park? Sure, I'll address it from the departmental perspective and allow the commissioners to address it from their perspective. Once again, we are planning robust programming, programming that is also geared towards families and children to create a welcoming environment. We will be having our summer market in City Hall Park. BCA will be managing a lot of the musical activations that will be happening in City Hall Park. My commission chair, Mark Boucher, mentioned Jim Daly in his team. That is my foreman and head of maintenance. He also manages the enhanced maintenance personnel for City Hall Park. We feel that immediate removal of graffiti as well as active trash recycling removal, things of that sort, including engaging with members of the community who spend large quantities of time in City Hall Park. So that is how we're approaching it from the departmental and staffing perspective. Okay, if the commissioners have nothing to add. I think with regards to the City Hall Park, we do not have much to add. It's pretty much out of our purvey, but we are doing similar things on the marketplace to those same goals. Wonderful. And the last question is specific to parking. And I know that because of the construction on Main Street, the City also has done an amazing job planning ahead and was just wondering about the perception of the visitors and also the merchants, whether or not it's working. Are people experiencing any parking shortage issue because of the construction on Main Street? Have you heard anything? So yes, we certainly heard from fee payers that they are concerned about parking. I'm less concerned about parking. And we've discussed this at our meetings. We hope there would be, in some sense, at this point, we hope there's a parking problem. That would be a good problem to have. Right at the moment, I think we need to do everything we can to encourage people to the street. We know that there's work that needs to be done. I think businesses certainly realize that the improvements to Main Street are gonna be beneficial to them in the long run. And they're gonna suffer some parking challenges with that. They're gonna push back against that because if there's anything we can do about it, we want to do about it. But I think that the Department of Public Works has been really engaged with the business community. I thought very well in discussing what opportunities and what options will be available for folks parking. It's never totally satisfying, of course, but at least I think people will know what's gonna happen. Then they'll be able to plan around that. That's my sense of what we've heard from folks. Wonderful, thank you again for everything that you do. You wanna add something? Go ahead. Commissioner Chair Boucher's comments and mentioned that my department is working very closely with Department of Public Works on parking. The parking facility in Courthouse Plaza is now being subsidized so that visitors can park in Courthouse Plaza parking garage at the municipal rate. We're also seeing that the downtown garage, which is only a four minute walk away from Church Street, is almost never at capacity. So I think that is helpful to people at the moment. In addition, my team through our Love Burlington brand, through all our social media outlets, has been addressing the construction and highlighting that businesses are still open for business. We have a very robust marketing plan and that is also being supported by a grant that I received from the state as part of their downtown vibrancy program that is going to help us expand the marketing efforts throughout the construction. Thank you, commissioners, and thank you, Director Alswari. Thank you guys. Thank you so much, Councilor Chang. If there are no other counselors who have any questions or comments, I would ask for a motion to waive the reading, accept the report, and place it on file. Anyone wish to make that motion? So moved by Councilor Yang. Okay, so Councilor Chang, seconded by Councilor McGee. Thank you for all jumping up at one time. Is there, if there's no further discussion, all those in favor of the motion, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. That motion passes unanimously. And with our thanks to all of you to Commissioner Bouchette, Holt, and Von Herman, and also to the entire commission, all of those that aren't here with us this evening. Thank you for your service to our community. Our next item is item 8.2, a resolution support for the redevelopment of the Memorial Block through further due diligence of a private, a public-private partnership. And for this item, we have Samantha Dunn, Assistant Director of Community Works for CEDO, Brian Pine, Director of CEDO. And I know that we have with us on, we do have with us, joining us by Zoom, we have Jeffrey Glasberg, who is the Development Consultant for Renaissance Development Company. I don't know if we have anyone else that is joining us, but if they, if we do, I'm sure you can, yes? Yes, Eric. Just present here are the parties that were involved in this project. Yes, by all means, I, something is in the way of me seeing the other person, but I'm assuming that Eric is here, is that correct? Yes, Eric and Joey. Yes, okay. Thank you, I see a hand. So, we have the council that approved the letter of intent on the development in November. We've met in executive session. We had a work session on the agreement in February. And tonight we are here to be voting on the agreement before we go to questions from the council and then a motion to be made by Councilor King. Were there anything, was there, were there any comments that you wish to make or perhaps the developers wanted to make? I think we're going to attempt to address some of the issues that have come up in the last few days and even few hours for you. Great. I think that would be most helpful. Really, the agreement before you is an attempt to provide sufficient time. That's why there's a nine month due diligence. So when you hear folks worry that we're rushing into this, I would hope you keep that timeframe in mind that this is actually a nine month joint process to assess the feasibility and desirability for redevelopment of the block. And when I say desirability, I think what I'm referring to is, is it in the city's best interest? Is it in the public's interest? It does not predetermine the outcome. Let me just repeat that. It does not predetermine the outcome of a nine month due diligence process. I think folks who've tried to represent that this does either have not read it or just have a misunderstanding of what it says because it does not do that. Let me just share if I could for the record. I believe it's important to read the memo that you all received today and was added to Civic Clerk under the documents that are associated with this agenda item. So it's addressed to the city council from Jeremy Farkas, MSK attorneys, dated today, March 11th, 2024. Subject pre-development agreement between the city of Burlington and Eric Farrell and Joseph Larkin as developer with respect to the potential redevelopment of the Memorial Block. The city council has requested a summary of the commitments being made by the city in the proposed pre-development agreement, PDA with Eric Farrell and Joseph Larkin as developer with respect to the redevelopment of the Memorial Block, the project. Well, the PDA commits the developer to conduct extensive due diligence at their own cost, I would note, with respect to Memorial Block and with respect to the project including to develop a project design and a program for the project for the city's review. The PDA only commits the city to the following actions. Allow the developer to enter onto city property and conduct due diligence subject to the terms of the agreement. Work with the developer to select an appraiser to determine existing value of the Memorial Block and its constituent parcels. Direct CEDO staff to timely review the developer's submissions and work product regarding the developer's financial capacity, the project program, design, construction phasing, infrastructure elements and deal structure and provide constructive feedback to indicate its areas of approval and any items of concern. Investigate the feasibility of relocating the central fire station to a new public facility to be constructed on city-owned property including by determining whether existing zoning and land use regulations and institutional controls permit the construction of a new public facility on the target property. Provide the developer with specifications and requirement for the new public safety facility. Coordinate developers planned improvements for the Memorial Block with the improvements the city has planned for Fletcher Free Library. Engage the public to solicit feedback regarding public uses to be incorporated into the program for the project. Investigate and identify potential funding sources and financial benefits that may be available to the project by reason of the city's involvement, support and or sponsorship including the identification of any requirements associated with particular funding sources and then communicate its findings to developer to assist the developer to develop its sources and uses proposal another term for budget. Work with the developer in good faith through CEDAW to develop solutions to or to overcome or remove municipal zoning limitations that would not permit the project to be developed as proposed with the understanding that only the Burlington City Council and Planning Commission have the authority to adopt amendments to the zoning ordinance which must be adopted in accordance with a book of laws, ordinances and regulations. If at the conclusion of all due diligence the city council ultimately determines that the project is feasible then the city will negotiate a formal development agreement to govern their future actions. If at the conclusion of all due diligence the city determines that the project is feasible but that a formal development agreement is not necessary then the city will negotiate either a ground lease or a legal structure acceptable to the city to facilitate the project. There were comments made earlier about what the agreement does do which I wanna just clarify a few of those. First of all, somebody used an analogy that it's a bit like getting the engagement ring and then canceling the wedding. I would say it's actually more like this is an agreement to be pursuing this path without if you're gonna use a dating metaphor we're not two timing. We're agreeing not to two time. We're agreeing to be sole partners in this process. We are not agreeing to have other entities come in and explore the feasibility. So this agreement does not consummate the city does not require the city to consummate a ground lease or any other contract to allow development to happen on this property. We does not obligate the city to repay the developer's due diligence costs does not require, repeat does not require the demolition of Memorial Auditorium or the central fire station does not require us to sell any land or buildings does not actually require the relocation of the central fire station. If the city deemed it is not in the public's interest. Lastly, it does not give anything to the developers other than what I've just listed here as far as obligations and commitments. I think it's important that we also address the question about of the voter approved bond for a million dollars to shore up the building at Memorial Auditorium what has been spent to date and so Samantha Dunn is gonna run through that. Thank you, Brian. This was also a late date memo that came to city council and has been added to Civic Clerk just to provide that clarification. There was a million dollars approved for stabilization and assessment of Memorial Auditorium of that one million dollars, about $350,000 of it has been budgeted to those activities with 200,000 of that actually being drawn down. The main cost to date was to reinforce the roof structure which was the most pressing stabilization issue in the building. The next major piece will be the fencing that goes up around Memorial Auditorium which is scheduled for this spring and is actually a protective measure in case bricks fall from the building so it's to protect the public. The other money has been spent on engineering and legal and consulting services. So that leaves obviously about $650,000 that will be dedicated to the preservation of the veterans memorials. Critical capital needs the building and continued pre-development work so just wanted to clarify that. Great, thank you. Before we go to questions and comments from the council, Joe, Eric, thank you very much for being here. Did you wish to add anything? I'm sorry, what? Okay, great, okay. So are there questions and comments from the council? Starting with Councillor Bergman. Thank you, thank you to Eric and John. Thank you to Brian and Samantha. Please, that many of the questions that I asked in this extensive document before were reflected in revisions and so I really appreciate that. But one of the questions which is still lingering and at Jeremy's memo actually made me more concerned I was really hoping for much more clarity but perhaps lawyers can't do that so well. Is the question of our absolute right to reject a development agreement without qualification if we decide that it's just not in the city's interest and the concern that I have with his memo actually is it focuses on feasibility and also the term viability which we start to get into the details of the agreement and it's not as open as I'm really feeling very comfortable with as I sit here. I believe that the intent is that you all do your work and we do our work and if we then here at the debate we say this doesn't work, the program doesn't work, the mixes of the units are not right, the way that you're negotiating it with the library and maybe even the church and the green space we just don't like it, it's gonna, we've got some issues and the majority because obviously it's about a majority says no that I have come into this believing that this pre-development agreement allows us to say no and I wish that it were really very explicit in here and I actually asked for that in my previous request. So somewhere along the line, I would love for that to be answered. I love for the other, the parties, both sides to understand that that is the agreement that we're getting that we are making. I mean, I've got a list of other little things but at the end of the day this is the big question for me. I think that's very clear and we've heard that it might be a little bit of a semantics thing. I think what Jeremy laid out in the memo is what we are bound to and not all the things that we are not bound to. So if we, the only way this moves forward is if the city council and the administration determine that the city wants to move forward. So I don't know how else to say it. I mean, we could ask for Jeremy to add that clarification to his memo but I think the way I understand it again is that he's not dictating what we aren't bound to only what we are. We are not bound to move forward and all parties understand that we can't move forward past this agreement without the support of city council, the majority of city council. So thank you, I appreciate city staff saying that is what my understanding is and I don't know if it is appropriate and it would certainly be appropriate for the other parties to say we're not gonna talk about this but it would be great to get on a record here that this is also the understanding of the developers so that we're really clear. Joe Larkin, that is my understanding that the city's not bound to anything else other than it was laid out in this document and it's what we are, time to do the due diligence and we'll present options and concepts as they evolve. Thank you very much. I mean, actually most of my other questions would relate to the discussion around the development agreement and if we actually decide to move forward and how that process is going to move forward. The sale or the firehouse and I just wanna say I believe that the way that this is structured should give us a firehouse at the end of the day without cost, if I'm reading it correctly because we're gonna be paying for all the costs that are associated and we're going to be transferring land so that it could happen and maybe that will be a detail that will get into a nuance and it may not exactly be like that because of the way that we're retaining property rights to the central fire district so I understand that. Given that, that was the big question. That's the thing that's hanging over my head. I think that from my perspective, this allows us to move forward. The one, I guess other question that's out there relates to the bid, no bid decision. We've gone ahead and we did a letter of intent but I think that it would be important once again for the public to hear why it is that we're not doing an RFP, why we had this discussion but here we are about to vote on this so I think it is worthy of repetition. Sure, I'll attempt to do that and I'm gonna ask Samantha to pitch in. Unique challenges to the block being that the city owns the corner of Winooski Avenue and Main Street and owns the corner of Union and then there's two parcels, three parcels actually between our parcels makes the challenges of getting a request for proposals very challenging because what we don't have is the ability to put out for proposal a redevelopment of property we don't have a controller interest in, right? So we would have that challenge as well. We have a history of seeking proposals for memorial in 2022, proposals that came forward were the ones that came forward and the marketplace speaks somewhat when it responds and those responses were not adequate and turns out not to be feasible so both of those were pulled off the table. So there's really an attempt to look at the entire redevelopment opportunity and when we talk about, I understand there was concern about the use of the word combining land and combining parcels, it has been raised that that's unclear but it's preceded by a sentence that essentially says in order to get the most comprehensive redevelopment vision for the entire block running from Winooski Avenue up to Union and to coordinate that with any future improvements that the library makes and workarounds with the church, it needs to be viewed holistically and comprehensively and to take parcel by parcel and approach it that way doesn't give you that ability. So I think just from an urban design, urban redevelopment standpoint, you can gain all types of benefits around shared access to parking that's behind the building, freeing up green space near the library and the church, a whole range of benefits that you can get from that approach that you really can't get if you start to do parcel by parcel. Thank you. So I'll be supporting the agreement before us. And we could talk more about the bidding process and what have you but I do think that this is a reasonable amount of time for us to see whether this project meets what we think is important and meets the public interest. Thank you. Thank you very much, Councilor Bergman. So we'll go to Councilor Hightower and then Councilor Doherty. Thanks for presenting this earlier. So we've all had time to look at this closely and review it. I also have to say that I would have the same concern as, thank you, I was like, Jean, what's his last name, Councilor Bergman? Um, had on the memo, but I do read and I just want to like read this again because this is what gives me reassurance is it talks a lot about viability and the schedule and termination on page 10. But the fact that it says that, you know, if we see it as viable, we can move forward. So I think the exact phrasing is they anticipate completing and submitting, but then it not only says that unlike the memo in the agreement itself, it says that if any party determines that the project is not viable, so not just to develop or any party or, and this is what makes me feel okay about the agreement, it cannot provide the resources time or continued strategic direction to undertake additional joint efforts. That feels like an internal examination not an external examination. So that feels sufficiently strong to me. I would say that I was disappointed that we didn't reopen the RFP. I think it'd be really comforting to be able to look at my constituents and say like, we actually reopened it. We actively pursued like different types of agreements and rather than the like passive on the website and I'm disappointed that we can't do that, but I do think where I think where that we're partnering with local developers that we know is at least a comfort. And then I also think I definitely would be more wary of the current administration weren't leaving. I both trusted Councillor Shannon and now elected Mayor Mulvaney-Stanik to have a more critical, this is not their agreement. This is, this would have been whatever, they would have been picking this up from the previous administration, which I think does have a more objective eye on what follows. So I'm, I'm much, I feel supportive of this knowing that I trust the next administration to take a more transparent approach and say this is what we're planning and maybe hope that we can, that criticism will be taken as amendments rather than disregarded. And so I thank you all for the time for this. I'm glad that we have a plan for the gateway block or whatever we want to call it. And I look forward to seeing what comes out of this process. Thank you. Thank you so much, Councillor Hightower. We'll go to Councillor Doherty, then Grant, then Traverse and Barlow. Yes, thank you all for being here and for your continued work on this. My question also dealt with the RFP process. And I think Director Pine, you answered this, but as usual, I'm one of the first to fall off the back of the truck. And so let me, let me sort of say it back to you and see if I understand it correctly because I really do think it's important. A number of folks have raised with me the objection to this pre-development agreement being that we didn't have, we had an RFP process that was derailed or abandoned. And I think that I heard you say that the RFP process that was begun in 2019 and then proceeded over the next couple of years did yield requests for proposal, but that they were not ultimately viable, is that correct? I'll just clarify, there was a previous iteration that had Memorial Auditorium, there was one that had Gateway, I'm sorry, when I said that, I mean the parking lot, but there wasn't one that looked at the entire stretch. So this is that, this is what makes this particularly unique, but the 2022 process that sought proposals for Memorial ended without a viable path forward. And I think I understood you to say that, at least in your view, the reason why we didn't get viable, effective, or one of the reasons perhaps why we didn't get viable and effective proposals during that process was because we did not have site, we do not have site control over these three interior lots, is that correct? I would say it's probably more accurate to say we didn't include those other properties because you can't put out to proposal what you don't control. So it was just Memorial on its own, and so as a standalone, that was really not very attractive to entities that would undertake a development of that scale and complexity. It just didn't generate much interest. And in your view, that dynamic hasn't changed. It's gotten worse, costs have gone up significantly since then, it's gotten much worse. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much, Councillor Doherty. We'll go to Councillor Grant, then Travers, Barlow, and Carpenter. Thank you. So the discussion we just had was one of my issues. I actually remember reviewing one of the RFPs along with Jim Lockridge. We had had an email conversation about it because this project's also very important to him with regards to is it possible as part of public space to have a youth space? So I remember there being some grumblings because the RFP only yielded, was it two or three total? Two that were truly responsive, and then there was one that was just for a youth center, which wasn't really a redevelopment idea. Yeah, okay. So there was regrettably not a response that we could accept, and then one of them back out. There was a, but we deemed a successful proposal, but just before bringing it to City Council for approval, that group had started their own feasibility and due diligence and determined. It was financially infeasible to be able to renovate the building. Okay, thank you for that. I think I know I remember feeling like I wish there was more opportunity for more RFPs, but I wasn't, I don't know what my status was on the council if I was in the middle of running or what was going on at the time. And I know that one of the issues that we've had ongoing are issues around transparency and RFPs for a whole variety of things, quite frankly, not just something like this, which I hope will get better. But having said that, I will support moving ahead with this for the following reasons. Having the local developers have site control is clearly a huge influence in making this project work. The firehouse, it's a beautiful old building, but quite frankly, that firehouse is not safe. I just can't believe we have people working in there. It's not safe, it's like memorial, it's a victim of deferred maintenance. So then memorial, I think we have to, because we're really not looking at memorial, the building itself surviving, right? I mean, it's too far. I think we need to be definitive about that and maybe this process will help us be definitive about that because that is really important for the public to know. The deterioration in that building is horrendous and the money that was put in was just to keep it from falling apart and hurting people who were walking by it, which is how that, and so that's why we've kind of been like, if we commit to calling it the memorial block, let's do that so that it's always in our mind in terms of what it means to the community. I do like the idea of maybe somehow doing a replica of it that someone mentioned earlier, so we don't lose that classic architecture, which has historical significance here, so throwing that in. The other thing, I think when people say to a giveaway to the developers, I understand why people feel that way, but I don't think that is fully true given the situation. What's there right now is not nice to look at. I think we can all be in agreement. It is one of the main, next to the pit, probably second to the pit, it's one of our major blight coming out of COVID as we all know a number of projects got derailed and we're just left with this blight and it's had the issues of people breaking in, try to live in there, it's just something that needs to be dealt with so that we can move on in the community and as it is now, this is still gonna be taking a while, so the thought of starting with something new and someone not having site control and that would just add more years to this, so that's another reason why I am supporting it and these other two things I had, you've already addressed, so thank you. Thank you so much, Councilor Grant. We'll go to Councilor Travers, then Barlow and Carpenter. President Pollock, can I just respond to one? Oh, sure, of course. Sorry, quickly, Councilor Grant mentioned that it was, I think like a known that the building wouldn't stand and that's not accurate at this point. What was then said, which is accurate, that during this due diligence period, the developer in consultation with the city will be determining whether or not it's feasible for the building to be redeveloped and stay in place or a portion of the building. Okay, thank you so much. So we'll go to Councilor Travers, Barlow, Carpenter. Councilor Jang, I also see your hand up and not sure if it's up for a second time or if you just hadn't put it down, but we'll get to you in a little bit. Councilor Travers. Thanks, President Pollock. First of all, Director Pine, Samantha, thank you so much for your work on this. I know it's been a slog. I know, Samantha, you've mentioned to us that when you first came here, this was put in your lap to get done. It is quite the feat, obviously far from done yet, but I'm excited about this next step. And Eric and Joe, I'm excited by our taking the steps here to provide you all the opportunity to review the feasibility of developing this block. I will say that wearing my lawyer hat, I've reviewed the pre-development agreement up and down many times and agree with the comments that were made this evening, that we are only committing ourselves to that feasibility review. I would not be supporting this pre-development agreement if we were locking ourselves into any particular vision for this block. I suspect Eric and Joe also would not be supportive of this pre-development agreement if it was locking them into any particular vision for this block. Ultimately, it's after this due diligence period that I'm confident any next steps are going to require both the support of this city council and the next mayor and of course, Eric and Joe. Many of the comments we've heard around this project have reflected some understandable skepticism. I appreciate and understand that and this is a building with history. It's a war memorial. It's been an important community gathering spot. There's many people in our community that have lived here for some time that clearly have special memories and feelings and attachments to this building. I'll also say though that for me and many folks in the city who've arrived in Burlington in the last 10, 15, 20 years, I've only known this building as a place with no future. Lots of ideas, but no paths forward. And while some of the comments that I have focused on again, some understandable skepticism, I also want to take an opportunity to really express how grateful I am, Eric and Joe, to you all stepping up and coming forward. I know that you have many development opportunities around this city and this area, but you've chosen to take this on. I believe in large part for the betterment of our community. I think similarly, I'm very grateful for the local partners who've taken on the downtown city place project. And I believe again there, it's not a project that they had to take on. It's been a significant, I think financial burden for them in many respects, but they've taken it on. Again, I think because they've committed themselves and just as you have over many years to showing that you are community stewards. And so I appreciate you stepping up. I trust you all in taking this on and look forward to what's to come. I will say, former Councillor Busher mentioned in public comment that in this pre-development agreement there's some discussion about you all prior to entering into the design phase needing to engage the public right up front at the commencement of this to hear their feedback as to what this should look like. And I do wanna stress that I think that that will be very important. I think there's a number of projects that have proven to be successful throughout the city because they did really vibrant, robust public engagement very early on. I'm remembering in the South End in the last 10 years or so in developing the South End city market there, there were multiple meetings in the South End where our community was asked to really be part of this design process and to buy into that project. And I think it was incredibly important to the ultimate success of that effort. And so I just wanna take this opportunity to stress that as we move forward from here, I think that frequent early on public engagement process will be incredibly important to the ultimate success of any next steps. Thank you. Thank you so much, Councillor Travers. We'll go to Councillor Barlow and Carpenter. Thank you, President Powell. I am also supporting this. I'm excited to see what Joe and Eric come up with. And I appreciate the additional clarification that we've received, especially Jeremy Farkas's memo. But I had one question about one of the scenarios that in that memo, Jeremy anticipates as a potential outcome that the project is feasible but that a formal development agreement is not necessary. I can't imagine a scenario where that's the case. So I didn't know if there was something he was thinking about that the rest of us might not be. He, I think he's referring to a scenario where you've got such good alignment that you really can move to a contract that is more like a ground lease, if you will, for instance, that's probably the most typical outcome that would lead to that rather than necessarily, you can include in the ground lease a whole number of public policy objectives could be embedded in the ground lease. Okay, but it's probably safe to say that a formal development agreement would be the likely outcome. Yeah, okay, thank you. Great, thanks so much. So now we'll move on to Councillor Carpenter and then I'll see Councillor Jang if you wanted to speak and then we'll go to the mayor. Councillor Carpenter. Thanks, I don't wanna repeat what my colleagues say, but I have just a couple of questions. Although I wanna start with thanking Eric and Joe. I really see this as such a good opportunity. We have so struggled to get anything that would work on that in my old hat with VHFA. I can tell you a number of housing developers that looked at it, perhaps on the back of the envelope and just didn't even wanna bother with it. That building was built as a public auditorium. It's got too much volume really to lend itself to housing, which we all want. It just doesn't work. I mean, the Y looked at it so they could put a swimming pool in it. That's the kind of building it works for. And I just wanna keep reminding this. We would love to have a public auditorium that we could afford, but we can't. So one quick question is, did the CETO office ever do kind of a back over the envelope on what it would be just to keep it as a public auditorium? Yes, I don't have those numbers in front of me. It was estimated to be, this was in 2019 between 12 and $15 million to bring the building up to code essentially and continue as a public auditorium. As you know, I think most of us know prices have escalated pretty significantly over the past five years. So we would anticipate that would be more like a $20 million project at this time, $20, $25 million. And I think that's just important to keep in mind because to return it to what it wanted to be, we're talking $20, $25 million and we could not get the public to even come up with Ken. And so the public will has not been there for the city of Brillington to spend its own nickels to renovate. And that's not the first time we've tried. So I really, really am excited and we need to move on. And it will bring us something we very much need in housing, I believe, because we're gonna have to reconfigure. I think the addition of a hotel in downtown is very much needed and not incompatible at all with our housing goal. So I'm excited to be supporting this. Thank you so much, Councilor Carpenter. We'll go, Councilor Chang, did you wish to speak, yes? Go ahead. Yeah, thank you, President Paul and thank you, Director Pine and Tim for some level of clarity. But I think I'm going to start with a comment first. And my comment is for the public to also understand that the city is doing its best right now to not repeat the same mistake maybe with the city place with the don'ts in that issue. I think what the city is doing right now is the right steps in order to make sure that we're not binding ourselves to something that's not feasible. Also, wanting to really say thank you to my constituent Lisa and also to Sylvia for all of their advocacy for the Council to ask the right questions and to be diligent as well before we move this forward. I think the first comment that I wanted to make is the fact that these local developers are local people and the fact that we know them very well by the amount of delivery they have done for the city is something that we need to celebrate as well. And in Africa, they would tell you that if I give you breakfast and give you lunch, if I tell you that I will give you dinner, you have to believe me. And I think that's exactly what Eric has been doing with the city in providing both market rate housing, affordable housing. And I think if he's interested and reached out to the city to explore this, I think we need to believe and try to see what is what is what is possible. Councilor, Brian, Director Payan, I also want to really thank you too because of the historical perspective that you have bringing into this and also all the responses also via email that you've been providing to make sure that we all clear about what's in front of us. I think it's still from my perspective, a little bit unclear about this pre-development agreement in front of us. I think I'm hearing city council saying that it's a binding based on our responses. All they are saying is not binding. And it seemed that I just heard here right now today that if the feasible study is deemed good and necessary, there want to be all the development agreements. I just want to be clear that it's the case or it's not the case. If it is a feasible plan, will we have additional development agreements as we move forward or no? I think the, sorry about that. The important point is the council will ultimately make a decision yay or nay, whether to proceed forward. And if it's a development agreement that is probably the most likely document that will be put before the council, there is a scenario where it's a different approach, such as a ground lease, which spells out all the conditions the city is insisting be included could be done. We just don't want to presuppose that it's absolutely a development agreement when we come back with a different document and folks feel like we've done a bait and switch. So we're trying to keep it open on that end. Okay. And I mean, from your perspective and also from the perspective of the developers, is it okay if, for example, we delay this vote and request for the developers to actually do a little bit of community engagement, at least couple of NPAs in the south, in the north, to just talk to people about what they would like to do. And I think it will also be very important for the city, for the next mayor, Emma, Alex, to be able to have a say about this as we move forward. And was just wondering if we can, what will it take, other than a city council vote, you know, to delay the vote tonight and wait until April 1st in order for the city council to approve this and move it forward? Because we know that Miro Weinberger will be working with the next mayor in terms of the transition. And I think bringing that mayor to speed will be very beneficial to the city and also to the project itself. What are your thoughts, both you and the developers in the room? I'll try to see. I'll try to see. Am I talking too loud or close? I will attempt, I think, to address the request or the suggestion. Recall that I think what we said several meetings ago, if this council has received, as a body of 12 has received the information up to now, it seems justifiable that this council be the council that decides because you've all benefited from multiple sessions on this topic, a work session, multiple, we had an executive session at least once, we've had others, we had the LOI back in November. Remember, this is an agreement to attempt to reach a future agreement that will then be shaped by the next administration and, quite frankly, by the council. There'll be an iterative process that we'll be engaging in throughout this. So it's not as if today's vote closes the door, it simply opens up a new chapter that allows for the project to proceed down the path of further due diligence, further exploration and examination of what conditions we want to have in place to ensure the public's interests are advanced to the greatest extent. So I don't think there's a whole, there's not a whole lot to be gained by postponing until sometime in the future in April. I don't think there really is at this point. Because the public engagement that you describe can happen over the next several months, right? So that, yeah, do you want the developers to address this question as well? No, it's good, it's good. Because I don't want them to say, so we will walk out if you do that. So it's good for us to move forward tonight. I'm happy to support this and thank you all so much. Okay, bye. Thank you so much, Councillor Chang. We'll go to Mayor Weinberger and then to Councillor King for a motion. Mayor. Thank you, President Paul. And I appreciate the council discussion tonight. I'm encouraged. It sounds like we are on the cusp of taking this action to move forward together. And there has been a lot of discussion tonight about how the agreement is set up to allow both parties to withdraw and stop if this doesn't work out. And of course that is part of this pre-development agreement. However, I think it's important to say as we start this, it is certainly my hope that that is not what it happens. This has been a part of the city that really has underperformed, has not lived up to its potential for many, many years, decades. We have had that parking lot sitting there in the heart of our downtown, undeveloped since the prison was torn down in the 1970s. We have seen plan after plan from where our auditorium failed to materialize. There's a real chance that the future is different than that past. However, their work has happened just in the last few weeks. Millions of dollars in infrastructure work is happening now that removes one of the big development obstacles to the site. We have the right zoning in place now that is allowing downtown development to move forward in a way that we just haven't seen for many, many years throughout the downtown. It's now happening. Our partners here have site control and wanna work with the city to bring to fruition a comprehensive vision for the whole block. Something that we have struggled with and the past plans have died because we didn't have that that kind of unified site control and vision. And maybe most importantly, the city has at the table now, good partners who have a long record of success, of getting things built in this committee, in this community and who are willing to dig in. So that is my hope for what happens coming out of tonight. It's not that we have to back out of this but that we all dig in and we do the enormous amount of work that's gonna be needed by, in some cases like me, our successors to actually make this happen. I hope we're back here in a year not withdrawing but going forward with those agreements that are going to be necessary to actually make this a reality. Thank you, President Paul. Thank you, Mayor Weinberger. So before we go to Councilor King, Councilor Bergman, a brief comment. Yes, just on the suggestion by former Councilor Bushert just to be clear and to say I strongly support it. What she is suggesting is a large kickoff meeting in Contoy's about showing the public the site and asking for input. So before, really, really early in that, I won't read all the little things but it's really before exploring feasibility to let the public of today put forward their suggestions for you to consider or not to consider and then once you get a plan to have another dedicated meeting for the public here. So that is what she suggested. It seems to me to make a lot of sense. I mean, as we're trying to juggle the program, you look at that analysis of the program and so much of that is based on what the community needs and desires. So I wanted to share that and I support that, her suggestion. Thank you. Thank you so much. So we'll go to Councilor King. I would move that we waive the reading and adopt the resolution. Thank you so much, Councilor King. Is there a second to that motion? Seconded by Councilor McGee. Is there any further? Councilor King, did you want the floor back? Okay. Is there any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, let's try for a, if it is not, if we are all in agreement, we don't need to do a roll call. So let's give it one shot. All those in favor of the motion, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. That motion passes unanimously. Thank you so much to everyone on the city team and also to the developers who are here with us, Joe Larkin and Eric Farrell. And let's go forward and see where we go. Good luck to you. And we'll hope to see you back in nine months. Hard to imagine what nine months is. I guess that means the end of the year. Thank you again. We will go on to item number 8.3, which is resolution and support of the pre-development agreement for the South End Coordinated Redevelopment. And for this item, we have Megan Tuttle, Planning Director, Charles Dillard, Principal Planner. I believe we also will include Samantha Dunn, Assistant Director for Community Work, CEDO. And it looks like Brian Pine, CEDO Director is taking a seat on the other side. Before we get to questions or comments from the council, and I don't know, I believe that we do have John Collow, who is here from Ride Your Bike. I don't know if there's anyone else, but we can certainly promote him if you would like us to. I know that he is up here, but why don't you go ahead and I will find him. Okay. I think that's it. I just wanted to add that CHAPAN Director, DPW Director, CHAPAN Spencer is also here who's been working with us on the project, but was not with us when we did the public workshop last week. Unlike the last pre-development agreement, we have not heard a lot of questions. So I'm not sure that we have a lot, looks like Megan has something pulled up. To speak to you would give a brief overview on this process in the pre-development agreement, but are mostly here to answer any last questions before moving forward. I think that's right. I have the slides pulled up in the documents that are posted on Civic Clerk, but we're mostly here to be available to answer any questions that the council may have. Okay. I did find John underneath the writing on the screen is John. So we do have him, there we go. We do have him with us. Are there questions and comments from the council? Councillor Bergman. Something new here. So I see on page two, there is a reference to initial traffic analyses. And I raise this in a relationship actually to the southern connector. Sorry, I've been here a long time. And the relationship of the development of this area to the traffic impacts to the north, particularly the maple and pine intersection and how that information is being shared because we're going to be having something in one or two agenda items. And that is a big piece of that. So perhaps I can get a little clarity. Thank you, Councillor Bergman. And I have city engineer Norm Baldwin behind him who provides supplemental information. But fundamentally the whole goal of this master planning effort really is to do the upfront work in partnership with the other stakeholders. We have a transportation consultant on board who is using the Champlain Parkway projections as a baseline and then working off and above that for the development so that we get an accurate picture as we've discussed in the past, the Parkways analysis that was made a while back but by using that as a baseline we are having better projections moving forward. And one of the pieces we're looking at is how we phase this in such a way that all the mitigation may not be needed until you get to the second or third phase based on the traffic demands and modeling that we're doing. So I'm pleased it was going to take a long effort. We have a round table focused on traffic modeling in two weeks with the consultants and the stakeholder team. And I'm confident we'll be able to get enough data over the process to understand how to phase this responsibly. Thank you, let me just conclude by saying that I really like the approach which takes transportation demand management or transportation options as we're maybe reformulating that conversation. All of the solar orientation, this is very important and also the preservation of maker spaces. I mean, I expressed real skepticism early on for us eliminating the ability to have a commercial, industrial, manufacturing, enterprise, whatever you wanna call it, base here because Burlington should not be a bedroom community for the factories in the county. So far, this looks really good and I totally appreciate the work that folks from the south end, the counselors there did particularly on this, so thank you. Thank you so much, counselor Bergman. Councillor Travers, you have a motion to make and then if you wish the floor back. Sure, I moved to waive the reading and adopt the resolution and ask for the floor back upon a second. Great, thank you, Councillor Travers, seconded by Councillor Grant. Councillor Travers, the floor is yours. Thanks. And as always, thank you for all of the work that you've put into this project as well. I know that it's involved quite a bit as chair of the ordinance committee. It was my privilege to work with you all in rezoning this area as the South End Innovation District and it's very exciting to now take this next step. As written in the resolution, this is an incredibly unique opportunity to develop what I think could be the most sustainable, walkable, bike-friendly mixed income neighborhood in the city, placing a particular emphasis on public open spaces and resilient green infrastructure. I think this will be an amazing part of the current mayor's legacy. Director Tuttle, I think it will be an amazing part of your legacy here with the city as well. So again, thank you very much for your work on this. Just as with the memorial pre-development agreement that we did though, we can't consider next steps until we're better informed about the feasibility of developing this space, including but not limited to considerations of utility, wastewater, stormwater capacity, as well as as Councillor Bergman just mentioned, traffic and parking projections. And I'm looking forward to tonight allowing us to take the next step in that direction. Also just as with the memorial pre-development agreement, I'm also confident in the parties to this agreement. The folks at Ride Your Bike have done an amazing job with the Hula space, making it one of the most desirable innovative tech hubs in the Northeast. President Paul, you mentioned that John Collow is online. I know that Mr. Collow is involved with this not only through his professional relationship, but I hope I'm not giving him up too much here. This is his neighborhood. So I know that he and the folks at Ride Your Bike are really invested in the future of this neighborhood. Also, Champlain College already an anchor down there with the Miller Building, the Leahy Center for Digital Forensics and Cybersecurity really has a world-class facility down there that I think could perfectly fit in to the innovation district that we're looking to build there. And so I'm really confident in the parties that the city has selected to move forward with these next steps. So again, thank you very much for the work that you've done here and this has my strongest support. Thank you so much, Councillor Travers. If there are no others and no further comments, then we will go to a vote. All those in favor of the motion as made by Councillor Travers, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. The motion passes unanimously. Thank you so much to the entire city team and for the continued collaboration with Ride Your Bike and Champlain College for the redevelopment of this newly designated and exciting Southend Innovation District. Thank you so much for your work. Thank you. This will bring us to our next item, which is 8.4, a resolution updating inclusionary zoning permit, a payment in lieu. And for this motion, I will go to the lead sponsor, Councillor Hightower. Getting to the resolution language. It's okay. Sure. No, I'm not getting there, but I'm gonna move to waive the reading of the resolution and adopt. Thank you. That's it. For years in, I kind of got it. That is it. So motion is made by Councillor Hightower to waive the reading and adopt the resolution. Is there a second to that motion? Seconded by Councillor Bergman. Councillor Hightower, you wish the floor back? Yes, I would. Great. Thank you all. I'm excited to propose this resolution, which I've wanted to do for a very long time. Even before I was on the city council, I was on the development review board. When we, to some extent, when we did the analysis of what we wanted to do around inclusionary zoning and peeled back a lot of, peeled back some of what inclusionary zoning had been doing for a few decades. And I think we've seen a lot of increase in housing lately and housing proposals. And I just wanna make sure that as we move forward with building a lot of that housing, especially some of the really large projects that are underway that we do that in a way that is inclusive of all as our inclusionary zoning proposes to be. And so currently developers can pay, do a payment in lieu in some areas for inclusionary zoning. That payment can be as little as $35,000. However, as we've seen housing costs rise, construction costs rise, both of those, we've seen that that amount of money doesn't really help the city and doesn't help the city really do a payment in lieu. So that $35,000, that $70,000, that $80,000 doesn't pay for another unit to become affordable. And so this is asking the Planning Commission to take a look at specifically the payment in lieu. Also more broadly to look at inclusionary zoning, but definitely to consider making updates to make the payment in lieu closer to what the current gap is for making a unit affordable, which is somewhere between $100 and $200,000 of subsidy required. Thank you. Thank you so much, Councilor Hightower. So we will now, the floor is now open. Are there Councilors who wish to offer comments or questions at this time online as well? Councilor Travers. Thanks, President Paul, and thank you, Councilor Hightower, for bringing forward this important resolution. You're right that this is a matter that you've been speaking to for some time. Just shortly after I joined the council, it became very clear to me, your knowledge and expertise in this area. And I am hopeful that we'll be able to improve this in a way that speaking about legacy will be a part of your legacy as well in starting further discussion here. As we were talking about the South End Innovation District, for example, you were a really critical voice and are making some important updates to that zoning amendment that will actually require the construction of affordable housing in the South End Innovation District rather than utilizing the payment in lieu option. And I think that you gave that really important voice. So thank you very much for that. I also thank and hope that everyone on this council recognizes that the existing inclusionary zoning ordinance that we have, including the existing payment in lieu option, is insufficient in our truly securing affordable housing for families and folks in our community. So I think it's very important that we take this next step and do this next review. I have shared with Councilor Hightower and others on this council and it is posted on Civic Clerk Now, an amendment that really from my perspective does not change the substance of the resolution, which is to send to the Planning Commission a proposal to consider increases to the payment in Luffy, but rather it adds some language that I think is important context and that from my perspective, strengthens the resolution. I will move that amendment here shortly, but just by means of an explanation, it provides some additional details as to how we got here. The amendment speaks more to the actions taken by this council a few years ago to amend the payment in lieu option that existed at that time, which had not been utilized for more than a decade at that point in time. It adds some additional language about how our current payment in lieu system is working, providing some additional details as to how since we made this change, projects have utilized this. I think a couple projects have utilized this, contributing a few hundred thousand dollars to our housing trust fund, but again, I think we all acknowledge that there are some improvements to be made here. I think that the third piece that it does, and again, I don't think that this changes it substantively because I believe in discussions I've had with councilor Hightower, there's an understanding here that ultimately, while we're sending one proposal to the planning commission that it would be within their authority to consider other options as well, but the proposed amendment makes clear that while the option of increasing the payment in lieu fee is certainly one option for the planning commission to consider that the next mayor's administration may also consider and submit additional recommendations, which should consider not only the impact our IZ ordinance is having on the development of affordable housing, but also as well as the overall housing supply here in Burlington. So with those comments, I would move to amend the resolution to reflect the changes that are posted now on Civic Clerk as the amendment, it's the same title, but in capital letters at the end of the document, it says amendment and there are track changes in that document. Great, thank you. So a motion, an amendment is made by councilor Travers. Is there a second? Seconded by, second by councilor Carpenter. Councilor Hightower and councilor Bergman, thank you so much. Is that friendly to the maker? It is friendly. And friendly to the seconder? Yes. Excellent, so don't know if our acting city attorney remembers we did, we used to have friendly amendments, then we stopped having them and then we started having them. So now we have them again. Just need to make sure your microphone is on. Oh, sorry about that. Sure. It can be incorporated into the main motion with the approval of the maker and the seconder. Great, thank you so much. So that is incorporated into our resolution now. Councilor Travers, you had the floor, did you wish to speak any further to this? No, I'm just glad we gave attorney McNeil an opportunity to flex his skills here. Right. Nothing further, thank you. Are there any other councillors who wish to speak to this? Councilor Carpenter. Thanks, I just wanna thank Councilor Hightower for bringing it up. I actually haven't over the years been such a grand fan of the payment at Lou and whether we should have exemptions at all. But so I think just being able to look at that more broadly and whether we did it 20 plus years ago for a specific reason, which might not have been a great reason. I think we do want IZ units in the lowest income neighbors and they're actually sort of backwards how the payment will works. And then the other thing I just hope that our commission can look at is there's some way in this to help affordable home ownership? And I don't have any grand plan for this, but I just think broadening it is the right thing to do. Great, thank you so much, Councilor Carpenter. Seeing no other councillors in the queue, oh, my apologies, Mayor Weinberger. Thank you, President Paul, I do appreciate the chance to, I appreciate that we're having as a result of Councilor Hightower bringing this forward another discussion about inclusionary zoning while I'm still in this role. And I think with the amendments that have just been accepted, this is now something that I can support because it will lead to another city look at this important and ambitious and in some ways, noble aspect of our zoning ordinance, but one that at the same time has had impacts on the way the city has developed and evolved that we have to confront and address. That's what the study that we did back in 2017 said. It said that while inclusionary zoning had ensured a significant percentage of basically all new development that took place did have affordable units in it. It was one of the factors contributing to why we are not keeping up. We were not at that time as a city keeping up with the amount of housing supply being created in the County. And we were not keeping up with our immediate neighbors and we were not seeing the increase in housing supply that we needed to address the very serious housing challenges that we've faced. So when this resolution first came forward, which essentially would just reverse one of the very few really significant changes that was made in 2017 following that study, I was not inclined to support it. With this amendment, which I do think encourages our colleagues at the Planning Commission and invites the next administration to think hard about what we want from inclusionary zoning in the future and not just look at this change in the in lieu payment. I am hopeful that something very positive could come out of this. We are at a time when if you look around the country, other communities are grappling with their inclusionary zoning ordinances. There's a growing understanding that inclusionary zoning ordinances can negatively impact housing supply. And there's increasing willingness to address that not by getting rid of inclusionary zoning but by broadening how the costs of these inclusionary zoning units, which Councilor Hightower points out in this resolution are substantial. Instead of putting all of those costs on the very few number of people living in a small project, which is what my biggest concern is, big projects have a way of dealing with this. Other cities are starting to look for ways to spread those costs out more broadly. I hope that Burlington come in the years ahead, we'll get to a similar solution. I'm hopeful this amended resolution will set it on that path. Thank you so much, Mayor Weinberger. We'll go to Councilor Hightower and then to a vote. Great, and I just want to make clear that the reason this amendment was friendly is because it does two different things, which I think aren't necessarily done on the same timeline, which the first is to review the payment in lieu by the end of this year. And I will certainly be coming back to the Planning Commission and the following administration and the Council to make sure that that has been concerned. And then I think looking at a more sweeping change of inclusionary zoning in the future. And I assume that that will be a longer process. And I hope that we don't wait to update, make the updates of the payment in lieu until we have that more sweeping process. And then the last thing that I just want to say is because sometimes we talk about affordability and it's hard to know what that means. And so I just want to, on the city website for the 2023 to 2024 year, the income limit for a single person household to qualify for IZ is $79,600. And for a family of three, it's $102,000 to $300,000. We're not talking about very, very, very low income thresholds. We're talking about truly having folks who have a real income. And so it shouldn't be so much of a burden for us to meet our inclusionary zoning. It shouldn't be so much to ask a fraction of the housing to meet with those kinds of income limits. So I hope that we are not so, I hope that we don't, rather than seeing this as a burden, I hope that we just see this as a bar that we would hope that yes, developers and the folks and people's neighbors can help me. Thank you. Thank you so much, Councilor Hightower. Seeing no further discussion on this motion, we'll go to a vote. All those in favor of the motion to waive the reading and adopt the resolution, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. That motion passes unanimously, which brings us to the last item on our deliberative agenda. It is 8.5, the Champlain Parkway Fiscal Year 24, Project Budget Amendment and Consultant Contract Amendments. And for this item, we have DPW Director Chapin Spencer as well as Norm Baldwin, Assistant Director and City Engineer. Director Spencer and City Engineer Baldwin, did you wish to make some comments and then we'll go to the Council for any questions? Yes, thank you, President Paul. We are pleased to be here tonight to discuss four actions in front of you. However, before City Engineer Baldwin gets to describing and summarizing those four, I want to say thank you to the Councilors who provided a whole range of questions to me, making me realize that our technical memo didn't quite hit some high level contextual points. That I will hit a few wave tops of here and then happy to answer questions. I think it's important just to start off saying that this project has evolved through the success and effort of multiple administrations, multiple counselors to get from a four lane high speed highway to a 25 mile an hour two lane city street. We added a significant amount to the timeline in the supplemental memo that talks about us seeking to come back to the Council in May or June for the construction contract for the final phase of the project. The initial phase of the project is expected to be complete this July and that the section between Home Avenue and Lakeside Avenue that has been constructed as part of this initial phase would be open to the public for travel, walking, biking, driving at that time in July of this coming year. There are some rightful kind of concerns around how traffic is managed in the King and Maple neighborhood as part of this project. I have laid out some of the traffic calming efforts that have been embedded in this project to manage the anticipated 9% increase in traffic in the King and Maple neighborhood as a result of this project. There is description in here. Thank you to Councillor Bergman of some of our conversations with the King Street Center and our willingness to explore further traffic calming in the neighborhood if warranted when this project is constructed. In the memo as well, there's a breakdown of the financial requests tonight and whether they're for the initial construction contract or the final, but I'd like to just summarize some important financial elements of this that in total this project, which is $86 million in construction phase costs, only 7.1 million, which is a large amount is needed locally representing around 8.3% of the total project cost. Typical projects in the state, local communities have to pay at least 10 to 20% local match plus non-participating costs. So we have an ask tonight that will help finish the initial construction contract, but on the heels of that, we'll be back seeking another 2.4 million to match the final construction contract. And we will be working with the great team at the CT office and others to come with an allocation on how we are going to achieve that. I think it's important to recognize here that our state and federal partners have really been with us since day one and they are probably as eager as us to have this project complete and move forward to other Burlington priorities. We have many in the hopper from the Wunewski Bridge estimated at $60 to $80 million, Great Streets Bank and Cherry at $55 million and the Raleigh Art Enterprise at $37 million. By keeping our partnership with our partners, we are best positioned to get those projects done. And in conclusion for my part, I would just like to acknowledge that the South End Construction Coordination Plan has been an important tool to minimize impacts. I wish that the timing had been different and that the Raleigh Art Enterprise project were moving as quickly as the parkway here. That is not the case. However, by working in a coordinated fashion and with our partners, we're best positioned to achieve all of the projects in that plan. Norm, do you wanna summarize the four asks in front of us this evening? Yes, so thank you, Chapin. Thank you, council members for hearing us out. I think it's important to public understands and knows how this project has been sequenced and separated in terms of scope of work. The initial phase is Home Avenue, the new segments of the parkway, which is from Home Avenue North to Lakeside Avenue and crosses Flynn Avenue, Sears Lane then onto Lakeside Avenue North to Pine Street to from Lakeside to Kilburn. That's the initial phase. The final phase is both far ends of the project. Home Avenue to the 189 Interchange is a Southern segment in the final phase and then the final phase from basically Kilburn Street North to Main Street. I would note that the initial construction phase is about to resume April 15th. This is actually the entering the third construction season for the project and as Chapin noted, August, July is about when we anticipate that project will be complete. So this evening's ask is two elements, basically additional budget authorization to complete the initial phase and then additional contract authorizations for design, resident engineering services and project management. When we talk about design and resident engineering services project management, we're talking about two scopes. One is for us to package the current, actually to complete the initial phase of the project but then a final phase to complete packaging of design for the project itself for the final phase and then also construction administration. So those who don't understand what construction administration is is the designer of record is available to answer any questions as a project advances through construction. There's always questions, things that people need to have answers that wasn't conceived in regional design. So what does the specifics to this mean? It will require us for this initial phase to have an additional $900,000 in bond proceeds for non-participating costs. What are non-participating costs? And this project non-participating costs is typically largely soils, development soils being disposed of, DEC has established regulations that require us to manage soils in a very different way than other projects in the years past along with landscaping and lighting. Normal to any project though is a local match. We have a favorable local match of 2% which is for this additional ask is another $80,000 and that would be coming from the Street Capital Fund. Along with that there is additional budget authorizations and expenses that we're assuming that are offset by other revenues. We've dealt with contaminated soils that are petroleum contaminated soils that DEC is funding that will offset those costs. Water resource is asked to upsize some water supply lines along Lakeshaw Avenue in support of a future development project that is also gonna be offset by water resource funding. So the specific, so moving to the specific contracts we're talking about, Cloth Harbor Associates is the designer of Record for the Parkway. They are preparing design bid documents for the final phase of the Parkway right now as we speak. There, as I said, I noted that they are serving as construction administration for the final phase of the Parkway itself. Beyond Cloth Harbor there's WSP. WSP provides resident engineering services and public engagement support for the project. When we talk about resident engineering services they're basically people in the field observing construction making sure that what's being constructed and developed is consistent with the specifications and also keeping track of accounting for expenses and quantities that are associated with billing as we proceed with the work. And then finally, Dubois and King, they are serving as a project management support for our city team. They have unique talent and specific knowledge that in working within the VTrans standard of practice that has really been tremendously helpful in terms of us getting the highest value for the work that we're proposing. So all in all, those are the asks that we're seeking tonight. I guess I'll leave it at that and if there are any questions. Great, thank you so much. So we'll go to questions or comments from the council. Are there, I know there have been a number of, we did talk about this at the Board of Finance and I think there's been a lot of back and forth on this issue in the last maybe 24 hours. Are there Councilor Bergman? I keep looking to see if there's anybody else who will go in first, seeing none. So I just want to thank you for the meeting that I and Councilor Travers had with you guys the other day and leading to this supplemental memo and more detail. It seems clear from that conversation and tonight's discussion on the South End Innovation District that we are going to need to get as soon as possible that's traffic studies from the new development that we have just unleashed for this particular project and the impact on Maple Street and King Street and the others in that area. And so with that, I just want to encourage you to continue to work vigorously with the King Street Center and other people in that community, not just them, but to do the kind of public outreach to make sure that they're not choking on the traffic that we're sending down there because that's exactly what's gonna happen. And I would like you to just share with the rest of the Councilors the thinking around us getting the type of support for the Railroad Enterprise Project that we had talked about in our meeting on Friday because clearly what you've talked about are the challenges to getting the funds and getting the support necessary and we've talked about the need to get the Congressional Delegation to be active on this to get the Governor and V-TRANS to be active on this because if them people want housing like we're gonna put 1,000 units down there, 1,100 units then we best figure out a way that people are gonna move so they're not choking through a neighborhood of poor folk on King and Maple. And so we need them to be really clear and strong about that and there's a lot of money that we need to come up with that is not going to come from the taxpayer of Burlington in reality. There's just no way that we can afford that project. So perhaps you can share some of the ideas that you have had in terms of how we're going to try to garner that support with particularity maybe to the resolution that we were talking about. Great, thank you Councilor Bergman. Yes, we did have I thought a very productive discussion around how we advance the Railroad Enterprise Project just to refresh folks memory. We did get the environmental assessment, the NEPA permit several two months ago for the project which is an exciting pivot from having a concept to moving into preliminary design and being able to really flesh out the preferred alternative 1B which is that simple and yet important connection between Battery Street and Pine Street. So this project will take a lot of effort to get to a solution here. There is no right of way there currently we are gonna have to negotiate and be successful with many stakeholders and find a way to fund this. One of the discussions that Councilor Bergman and I had is what can our strategy be to help our stakeholders understand the importance of the project and to participate financially. I'm pleased to say that our partners have allocated 20 million dollars which is no small allocation for this project even when it was conceptual but we're estimating with mitigation a project in excess of 37 million dollars. So there's a gap and as you know we cannot do that alone. So the thought was to have a work session with the Council prior to a vote on the Parkway final construction contract and a potential resolution from the Council to reflect the importance of the Rail Yard Enterprise project and to direct us to work with the Congressional delegation and our partners to secure the balance of funds needed on the REP. It is one of the pivotal projects that all fit together into that south end plan. Thank you. Let me just conclude by saying I have publicly said that I would not support the Southern Connector unless we had the enterprise, the railroad enterprise project and the sequencing puts me in a very, very difficult position. You've heard basically the articulation of my concerns on this. We're, yes, they're equity issues. They, we are kicking in a fundamental way the can down the road to May and June with this proposed decision tonight because we're not really authorizing the final construction until then but it is clear that we are gonna have to do that. I just wanna state that absent strong support from the Council and strong support from the administration and there'll be a new incoming administration but the department and real active work, I will not support the final phase. I'm willing to go this next step, right? But we have got to make the promise of transportation equity of the ways that we're gonna deal with the environmental racism that's inherent in much of what was planned to be eliminated. We have got to take that in this Council. We'll have that decision and I will have to make that decision but I am prepared without further to vote no on that and I understand the consequence and it is not one that my tax bill would enjoy at all and nothing that I would like to do but it is fundamentally essential that we get this right and we do the job for the people. So thank you. I'll be supporting whatever motions that are made on this. Great, thank you, Councilor Bergman. I don't see anyone else in the queue so I'm happy to go to Councilor Barlow for a motion. I would move the four-part action recommended on Civic Clerk and hope that acting attorney McNeill doesn't make me read all the long text associated with that. If the Councillors are clear on what they're voting on you don't have to read it. It's only if there's a need for clarification. I think I hope we're all set with that. We just need simply a second to Councilor Barlow's motion seconded by Councilor Travers. Seeing no further discussion will go to a vote. All those in favor of the motion as made by Councilor Barlow please say aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no. That motion passes unanimously. And with that, that concludes our deliberative agenda. We have just a couple of items left. Item number 10 which is committee reports. Are there any Councillors who wish to offer a committee report? Thank you very much Director Spencer and Assistant Director Baldwin. Any Councillors we're getting in the last couple of weeks of the end of a Council year. Are there, yeah, great. Councillor Barlow. Only because it's imminent. But we have a special TOOC committee meeting on Wednesday at four o'clock at 645 Pine Street to talk about GMT funding. Great, thank you. We do have a public safety committee meeting that will be on March 21st at 5.30. We are going to go over the CNA matrix which will be very familiar to Councilor Hightower having spent many, many hours working on that CNA matrix. We have not revisited it in some time. And so we are gonna go back and revisit that and get an update on the action steps that have been taken so that we can update that going into next year. The other thing also is there is a resolution that you may all recall that we passed in mid 2023 which was about Burlington Cares, funding for Burlington Cares and also an exploration of Cape becoming a department of the city. We will get a report on that at the meeting on the 21st. That was part of the resolution and then it would be referred to the full council. And again, that's March 21st at 5.30. Are there any other, are there any other committee chairs who wish to offer a committee report? Seeing none, we'll move on to item number 11 which is city council general city affairs. Any councilor who wishes to offer a comment on general city affairs? And if we don't, that will move us to item number 12. The city council president updates, I actually did give during the, at the end of public forum. And that is just simply, I believe that we've also all got an email now from a planning director, Tuttle with the link to where the amendments are on the neighborhood code. There are six of them and then one that's a hybrid. So please take a look at those if you have any questions for planning director Tuttle. Now would be the time to, in the next two weeks to do that. That brings us to the final item of the evening which is item 13 updates from the mayor. And the mayor is here with us. Yes, please go ahead. I've spoken a lot tonight. I don't wanna take a much more time. I didn't speak on that last item and I just wanted to say thank you to the city team that has gotten a project that was stuck for 34 years in construction again and get bringing it forward to a point where the second phase can be considered as council Bergman noted. And I hope moves forward in later this year and also advancing the rail yard enterprise project to from conception to a point where it now has reached this very substantial milestone of getting past the environmental assessment. So the DPW team that has worked so hard to do that. I wanna say thank you and congratulations. Great, thank you very much mayor Weinberger. So our next meeting and our final meeting of the council year will be Monday, March 25th. This brings us to the end of our agenda and I would ask for a motion to adjourn. Councilor. We'll second that. Councilor Hightower, seconded by Councilor McGee. All those in favor of the motion to adjourn, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say no. We find ourselves adjourned at 10.36 p.m. Have a great evening.