 Welcome to the Burlington Democratic Nominating Caucus. My name is Ben Travers. I'm the Democratic City Councilor from Ward 5, and it's my privilege to host our Nominating Caucus this evening. Before beginning, first, some huge thanks are owed to a number of individuals. First and foremost, our party chair, Adam Roof, as well as other volunteers for the local Democratic Party, as well as to town meeting TV for streaming our caucus this evening. Without their volunteer work, this event would not be put together this evening. As we continue to face challenging issues as a country, as a state, and as a community, I'm proud and excited to be a Democrat. At the national level, our Democratic incumbent president bucked historical midterm trends by holding onto the Senate, by electing great, steady leaders like Senator-elect Peter Welch. And we held back the so-called red wave in the House, a House that will soon be joined by Representative-elect Becca Ballant, Vermont's first female and first openly gay representative to Congress. In Montpelier, we just strengthened our Democratic majority. We'll elect Burlington's own representative, Jill Kruinsky, to another term as the House Speaker. And we'll elect another Burlingtonian, Senator Phil Baruth, to serve as our Senate pro tem. And here locally, Democrats secured a majority on our city council just last week with the election of Mayor Brandt to serve as our East District City Councilor. Under the leadership of Democratic City Councilor, President Karen Paul, and our Democratic Mayor, Merrill Weinberger, we are continuing to work towards rebuilding a transformed police department. We are innovating on how to address our houselessness crisis. Cranes are rising above our Burlington skyline to develop hundreds of new affordable housing units. And we are working on additional steps forward to meet our net zero climate goals. I'm proud of our city. I'm proud of Burlington. I'm proud of our future. And I'm excited about how many of you are engaged in building that future. More than 1,000 people registered for tonight's nominating caucus. Best I can tell for a non-Mayor election like this one, that basically breaks any known records and comes pretty darn close to the last record was set for a contested mayoral caucus. We're excited to have Merrill Weinberger tonight. In addition to our candidates and thanks are owed to the candidates and their teams for their participation in this evening's caucus. Before turning it over to Merrill Weinberger, let's talk about some logistics for this evening's caucus. So as folks know, we will be conducting the election by virtual ballot. Ballots should have started being delivered to folks inboxes starting at six o'clock tonight. While we encourage folks to certainly stay tuned in to hear the speeches from our great candidates. Again, those virtual ballots started going out at 6 p.m. For folks who are tuned in right now, we ask that you please check your inboxes. If you provided a cell phone number when you registered, you should receive updates there as well. And you'll receive reminders between now and when voting closes until you cast your ballot. If you have not received a ballot, help is available. And as you can see here on the screen, please email Burlington Dems at gmail.com or call 802-777-3255. Again, Burlington Dems at gmail.com or call 802-777-3255 if you find that you have not received your ballot in the next 10 to 15 minutes or so. Our virtual ballots will remain open tonight until 9.30 p.m. Results will be released as soon as paper ballots and virtual ballots are all counted. And for folks who are interested in the results, which I expect all of you are, you can expect the results to be shared at around 10 p.m. tonight. There are circumstances under which in a contested caucus, we may need to have a runoff election. And our bylaws there are such that if in any round of voting, no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, we will need to have a runoff. If that occurs, a runoff election will happen at least 24 hours after the close of voting. So in that event that occurs, folks should not expect ballots tonight but should expect an update in the next 24 hours to come when new runoff ballots will go out. Certainly candidates involved will be consulted on the specific timing of the runoff vote and the party bylaws do not unfortunately currently allow for an instant runoff. So we will have to do another ballot. Again, virtual ballots should be out. Check your spam folders, check your inboxes. Voting will close at 9.30. And if folks have any trouble, please contact BerlinCondems at gmail.com or the number here on the screen. I wanna thank again our party chair, Adam Roof, for all of his work in putting this evening's caucus together and the number of other volunteers who have been part of putting this evening together. Let's talk a bit now about our agenda this evening. First, we will momentarily hear from our mayor or a Weinberger. We will then open our four different district caucuses. We will hear first from candidates in the South District where we have that is our only contested caucus where we have four candidates. We'll then hear from our candidate from the East District, our candidate from the Central and North Districts with a vacant seat on the city council in ward eight as well, whereas typically this would be the year that we hold our elections for the district caucuses with the vacant seat there. We will also hear from a candidate for our ward eight open seat. And we appreciate you tuning in. And of course, greatly appreciate having Mayor Weinberger here this evening. We will soon have ballots out to all of you if you have not received them already. And looking at our attendee list, we are just waiting for Mayor Weinberger to join us at which point we would love to hear his remarks. Again, just so folks know, while we are waiting for the mayor to join us, he is joining shortly here. I see that we're just getting the link out to him. I'm going to share my screen here again with additional information on the ballots going out. You should have them. And if folks have any trouble, Burlington Dems at gmail.com or the number up here on the screen. Just very briefly with the time that we have here. And again, we do expect Mayor Weinberger to be joining us here very shortly. As I mentioned before, we will be starting with our South District caucus. Our first candidate and our speaking order there was chosen randomly. We'll be Joan Shannon, followed by Fareed, followed by Jason Ben-Dresch, followed by Lenora Travis. Greatly appreciate the candidates being here this evening as well as the folks who will be nominating them tonight in the interest of keeping the caucus as time efficient as possible. And knowing that we have, it looks like a pretty big winter storm barreling down on us. We have set some time limits for our candidates, two minutes for the folks who will be nominating them and five minutes for each of our candidates once we begin that caucus. We will turn again, first to the South District caucus then the East District, then Ward 8, where we'll hear from Hannah King in the East District, where we'll hear from our newly elected City Councilor, Mayor Brandt in the Central District, where we'll hear from Avery Muzakar and in our North District, where we'll hear from Mark Barlow. We'll pause here momentarily, just waiting for the Mayor to join us and then we'll get started. Thank you. All right, I understand we have the Mayor here. Mayor Weinberger, greatly appreciate your being with us here this evening. I understand that like a lot of folks with school events tonight, that you were at an event with your kids here at our schools and greatly appreciate your being with us as Burlington gets ready for its first big winter storm of the year. So thank you for being here and Mayor, I'll turn it over to you now. Hey, thank you, Ben. Yes, great IAA event, filled the bowl happening tonight, but excited to be here with all of you. Thank you, Ben, for your leadership here and thank you Adam Roof for what you've done to pull together this event tonight and this caucus, this local Democratic Party in general for two years now. The participation of what I believe is hundreds of you tonight in the Burlington Democratic Party's largest city council nominating caucus ever is, it's an exciting event for us. The, your participation is another indication of the grassroots energy that just elected Mayor Brandt as the new East district Democratic city councilor two weeks ago. It's another indication of the party's energy that we'll be nominating tonight, strong competitive candidates in all four districts. We are excited that current North district city councilor Mark Barlow is here with us tonight seeking Democratic endorsement for the first time as a city councilor and entering into a new relationship with local Democrats about how we're working together going forward. And as a bonus that wasn't expected, if we are able to sustain this energy through March, we have an excellent opportunity to gain another councilor in a special election for the vacant ward eight seat where Hannah King is stemming up from Burlington again and running after falling just a handful of votes short in a great run last spring. Party is gaining momentum because Burlingtonians know that this is a period of great challenge and great opportunity when local government really matters. In further, voters know that it is the Democratic caucus that has led this city through major crises repeatedly over the last decade and is prepared and able to lead the community through the challenges of today. You know, it was a while ago now but it was our party that fixed the Burlington telecom crisis locking in tens of millions of dollars in savings for taxpayers and ratepayers. And in doing so, giving us the financial strength that has impacts today gives us the ability to bond for historic investments in our roads, sidewalks, parks and just last month to commit to building the long overdue 21st century high school. It was our party, the Democratic party that deployed emergency reserves that we had carefully built up over years towards one of the most aggressive and successful fights against COVID of any city in America. And it was the Democratic caucus that got it right in the public safety debates of the last two years by saying, we don't need to choose between public safety and racial justice. We must have both. I'm proud to be working with the Democratic caucus, the Democratic counselors on the city council to rebuild the Burlington police department and support officers serving in what has long been one of the most effective and progressive police departments in the country and to continue investing in what has become just in the last few years the state's leading racial equity inclusion and belonging department. We got a lot of work ahead of us that's gonna require clear-eyed leadership. Our many decade long housing crisis has become even more acute. And shockingly, now that we're facing major war in Europe and inflation is at its highest level in decades it really seems that we will continue to experience economic uncertainty and volatility for some time to come. And while we're addressing all that navigating all that, we can't slow down on our commitment to become a net zero energy city something that we have laid out some of the most ambitious local goals for in America. I know that it is our party, the Democrats who will deliver the focused actionable policies that will move our community forward. Tonight, you all have a chance to put on the ballot candidates in every district who are committed to running as Democrats to caucusing with and working with the Democrats and who will be strong partners to this administration. And after you cast your votes tonight we need you to stay with us. We need to capture the energy of tonight in recent weeks and capture that with support for our Democratic candidates and maintain it through the short months ahead between now and town meeting day. We need you to donate to volunteer to share with your friends and neighbors why you believe that a city-wide Democratic ballot is right in Burlington. And most importantly, we need you to vote on or before as has become a great tradition now town meeting day. So thank you. I look forward to hitting the campaign trail with all of you soon and with the Democratic slate that we elect tonight. Ben, Adam, thanks again for giving me a chance to share that. Thanks very much, Mayor Weinberger. And thanks again for making time for us this evening and then for those remarks and for your leadership here in Burlington. Without further ado, we'll move first, as mentioned before, into our South District caucus where we have four candidates who have put forward their names to run for the South District City Council seat. As mentioned before, the order of speakers was selected at random for those candidates that have folks here to nominate them. We will start by recognizing the nominator and then turning to the candidate. Our first candidate up is Joan Shannon and here to nominate Joan is Shakuntala Rao. Shakuntala, can I turn to you now for up to two minutes in a nomination speech? Thank you. Yes, thank you. I'm Shakuntala Rao. I live at King and Pine and have worked with like many progressives in the past. Tonight, I am honored to nominate Joan Shannon as a city councilor to represent the South District. Over the years, I've reached out to Joan regarding multiple matters, such as traffic, zoning, crime, and policing. In all these years, Joan has responded to all my concerns. For her, these concerns then become a dogged pursuit to make sure that her constituents are heard and that she works proactively on our behalf for the King Street neighborhood. Clearly she has a deep care for her community. Joan was here for us on King Street when we were challenged by crime. Joan was there for South Meadows when residents homes were destroyed by fire and Joan was there for single family home owners struggling to make sense of their reassessments. I understand that political rhetoric these days has become increasingly about us versus them. For example, if you speak to wanting a well-funded police force, you must be against racial justice. As a BIPOC person, I do not see the world in such a divided manner. And I know that there are BIPOC residents in the South District and the city who would agree with me that Joan is not one who would think in such ways. In Joan, I have found a proactive ally who is not condescending when I speak of increased policing in my neighborhood. We have discussed how complicated public safety issues are where BIPOC residents often want police presence and want to support the police to keep their neighborhoods safe. Joan is one of those politicians who does not speak for me, but gives me the platform where my voice can be heard and in a way that truly reflects our experiences. It has also become fashionable these days to say we need change and that somehow incumbency is undesirable. Change is inevitable, but changing for the sake of change often does not provide good outcomes. My nominating Joan today testifies to how she doesn't really care that I have been a lifelong progressive when it comes to helping and working with me. I urge you to vote for Joan Shannon today and I urge you to vote for her on town meeting day. Thank you. Thank you, Shakuntala. Joan Shannon, the floor is yours, five minutes. Thank you. Thank you, Shakuntala. You've been an unexpected supporter and ally in this campaign and I am so grateful for your very kind words. Thank you to the Burlington Democrats, Ben Travers, Hannah King, Andrew Champagne, Town Meeting TV, and especially Adam Roof. Their commitment to organize this unprecedented event and assuring broad inclusion has been outstanding. This challenge from Jason, Fareed, and Lenora has created an opportunity for hundreds of conversations with all of you. Thank you. There are many issues that we hold dear as a community, affordable housing, climate change, and school excellence. With only five minutes, I will focus the bulk of my comments on public safety. Public safety is much broader than policing. Public safety begins with healthcare for everyone. That includes mental healthcare. I believe the challenges we are seeing today in Burlington and nationwide are the result of defunding mental healthcare and other essential public safety net requirements, starting in the 1970s and 80s. In the last decade, we've continued to lose mental healthcare beds as demand for them has risen. For those of us in need of mental healthcare and unable to access it, self-medicating is an understandable alternative despite being destructive and sometimes deadly. It should be no surprise that we are seeing an explosive rise in powerfully addictive drugs in our community, given the lack of access to mental health treatment. Drug use, drug dealing, theft, drug violence, and gun violence all have a common root. They rise from deep societal problems which are nationwide and we need government to actively address them from all levels. We cannot depend on policing to solve these deeply seated societal problems. We cannot depend on incarceration to solve them. We need active mental health interventions and treatment at the first signs of illness. Our community support liaisons and a CAHOOTS type model of policing in partnership with mental health providers is a start. But we need systemic mental health investment. People need help when they first seek it, not after they have become destructive and or a deadly threat to themselves and others. What's our vision for the future of policing? Better policing requires more training and more police officers with more time and skills to de-escalate situations and to stand back and protect their social worker and EMT partners. Our police need more staffing to do this. We need to improve our professional police oversight. I've spent over a hundred hours studying the training policies and procedures of the Burlington Police Department, and I can tell you, I am in no position to judge their performance relative to their training and directives. Professionals require professional oversight by supervisors and independent peers. Audio and video in a variety of work settings can be used to support and commend best practices in action, as well as to make corrections when workers fall short. Police officers should receive the same evaluation, not to be punitive, but to be supportive. We need all officers to do their jobs well. Our new police contract gives us the ability to establish such a program, which intervenes before bad habits become bad outcomes. I believe this is an important element of good policing and reform that I wanna pursue. Racism is both a public health threat and public safety threat. I want black and brown people to have the same opportunities that I have and the same benefit of the doubt. This is important to me because I see and feel the pain of my chosen family members who are black and do not enjoy the privileges that I have. I love them and I'm committed to working as a partner to our racial equity inclusion and belonging department to improve the lives of our BIPOC community members. Affordable housing is another basic need that should be supported by allowing the construction of housing and assuring every community member has an adequate and safe shelter. This is both humane and required for a society to function. Healthcare workers need housing. I will evaluate housing and zoning proposals with an eye toward integrating new development with the existing development while allowing increased density. I am committed to growing our housing stock in a way that preserves adequate industrial space and provides green space to combat rising temperatures. Lastly, a healthy community needs a healthy planet and I strongly support the climate initiatives of our locally owned electric utility BED. This is where Burlington has the most opportunity to be a leader in abating climate change. While we have a lot of work to do, we do have a path forward. I ask you for the opportunity to continue to navigate our challenges and bring our community together in our collective vision. Yes, it will require compromises and I am very much ready and willing to work with everyone in the community and on the council to find and advance our common vision. To get there, I will continue to ask your opinion. That's what matters. Thank you. Thank you very much Joan and thank you for running. Our next candidate up is Fareed. Fareed's nominator is Zina Bula. Zina could not be here this evening but provided us with a prerecorded statement. And so I'm going to share my screen right now with Zina's statement. Zina Bula, I live in the Burlington, the south area. What I really enjoy about the south is the playgrounds, red rocks and the bike path. One of my concerns today is the incurring increase of violence and crime in the community. How can we fix this today? Something I think soft metal can benefit from is the community room. So we can have community events such as birthdays, concerts, maybe more. We need a space, come together as a community and talk about what changes we can make today. I met Fareed three years ago delivering to me a four Ramadan dish for my family. I inanimate Fareed for his great work and for always bringing in community together. I'm very thankful for them. And I inanimate him for his great work. Thank you and have a good evening. Fareed, congratulations on your nomination and we'll turn the floor over to you now for five minutes. Thank you. Fareed, I think you have to go ahead and unmute yourself, sorry. Thank you Ben and thank you sister Zina. Salamu alaykum, my name is Fareed. I live on Legimir Street in the five sisters neighborhood. And I share sisters Zina with the touring public trust in the police department to the rebuilding of the department. I know the loss of public trust in our local and I know the inadequate staffing issue is a nationwide crisis that police departments are experiencing in nearly every town in Vermont, even those who have increased their funding. I don't think putting a cap on a number of officers is a solution. And if we pass this police accountability ballot question that I am advocating that you will see in this March ballot I would call for council resolution to remove the cap to increase pay and increase inside their families and leave as member of our community. But I do think we need the accountability piece in place. And also let's remember that law enforcement is only a small piece of public safety. And I'm bigger than the police department. We need to reimagine public safety by re-centering the public and in including the public in all the decisions and all the planning and in all our processes when we approach public safety. And I do think that the strong community is what is the best guarantee of public safety. And the pandemic has shown that a community is only as strong as the most vulnerable member. And so we need to ensure equity and we need to keep taking care of our most vulnerable using the best tradition that Burlington has which is out of box thinking. Let's do better in imagining what public safety looks like. Let's make sure public involvement is first and foremost. And I also would urge everybody to vote yes on the ballot question to add the powers of the people to our charter allowing voters initiatives, referendum and giving us the flexibility to propose and enact ordinance through a majority rule. I'm grateful to be part of Burlington community. It's a beautiful community. I think I will close with an anecdote that give me the reason why I'm running. The People's Kitchen organization that I volunteered for was excited and honored to be part of Burlington's first Juneteenth celebration when the new department of racial equity, inclusion and belonging reached out to us along with other food vendors each contracted to serve about 500 meals in four different sites throughout the city. We were assigned to serve at City Hall Park anticipated to have the most turnout. Planners underestimated Burlington's enthusiasm with thousands turning out that day to commemorate this major victory for people's liberation in our history. The crowd size was such that by 330 we had 500 meals served. There was a line of people ran out of food. We still had four more hours. It made no sense for them to keep serving and have to pay because the city is underestimated. So what did we do? We decided we couldn't in good conscience leave Juneteenth at the heart of our city the first Juneteenth without the free food advertised to people. So we put our general request out to the local farms to the stores and co-op in our network of supporters and we recruited dozens of additional volunteers from people waiting in line. We kept on hauling ingredients, prepping, cooking, serving and by 7 p.m. we had emptied our two commercial freezers gone through over 200 pounds of meat, 500 pounds of produce, 1800 meals to at least 1500 people. There were a lot of seconds and thirds. So serving on that historic day for our city and our nation was the goal for us. And we had faith in our community. We put it all out there and our community responded in spades. I guess what I'm trying to say is that we need to remember like government makes mistakes, businesses fail, nonprofits fail. But as long as we have community, I think we'll be all right. So we need to empower our community, please say yes on holding BPD accountable and on enabling public participation. And the people's right to have a say in making the decisions that impact our lives. Thank you very much. Thank you for reading. Thank you for your involvement and advocacy. Our next candidate up is Jason Van Draysch and here to introduce Jason is Zoe Keating. Zoe, can I turn it over to you? Yes, can you hear me? Yes, we can, thank you. I am really honored to be nominating Jason Van Draysch to represent the South End. I've known Jason and his family for several years ever since I moved here. And I just think he's gonna be great on city council. He really thinks deeply about the issues. We've had so many conversations about bike lanes, housing crisis, climate change, affordability. I just really admire his integrity and that he does what he says and he lives what he talks about. I find his optimism and his eagerness to get to work really refreshing. I also like the way that he brings people together to do stuff. He's a really good listener and he cares so much about community. Jason really knows that it's not enough to achieve goals if some people are left behind or if the process itself creates bitterness. I think that he will do a great job of bringing people to the table and listening and compromising if need be and just getting there. Burlington is going through so many challenges and I really think that we need to work together to get there. And the other thing I wanna say is that I didn't know anything about the Democratic caucus or the nominating process. And I'm so inspired at the idea of having Jason at city council that I got involved. And I know several other people who have just discovered this caucus thing as well. So I think that just I'm super excited that he's running and I wish him the best and please vote for him. So that's it. I hope I did it right. You did it perfectly Zoe. Thank you very much for being here. And yes, we're very excited. As folks have mentioned, as I mentioned up top we have more than a thousand people registered for this caucus. So that's fantastic. And Jason, congratulations on your nomination and I will turn it over to you now. All right. Thank you very much everyone for being here tonight. My name is Jason van Draysch. I'm a 14 year resident of the South End, a city planner and a community builder and a father. I'm running for city council because I believe in Burlington, all of it, all of us that we want our community to thrive and that the only way to get there is together. And I believe that if we want Burlington to thrive we have certain obligations to each other. One of them is keeping each other safe. Community safety is really the foundation for everything else. I've talked with hundreds of South End residents over the past few months and community safety has been a nearly universal theme. People are deeply concerned about the increase in crime especially violence over the past few years. What's more, almost everyone I've talked to has been visibly distraught at how the debate itself has torn our community apart. We are caught in a web of interrelated crises in Burlington, mental health, substance abuse, homelessness, gun violence and more. We are not going to solve these crises anytime soon. They are way bigger than our community but we can and must do three things. First, we urgently need to reduce violent crime and serious property crime. Burlington needs to be in the news for innovation and opportunity, not for bike theft and drug dealing. Shootings in broad daylight in the middle of downtown and epidemic of break-ins and thefts, these are alarm bells. This is an emergency. To do this, we need a police force that has the capacity and the will to respond wherever and whenever they are needed. Sometimes with armed officers, sometimes with unarmed crisis interventionists. More officers is part of the answer but it isn't the only answer and more officers would not get at the root of the problem because at its root, our policing problem is a problem of trust. A police department that doesn't trust its city council, a city council that doesn't trust its police department, both blaming the other and the rest of us caught in the middle, left wondering, am I still safe in my community? Second, we have to dig even deeper on mitigating the impacts of these crises on the people they affect most directly. We urgently need more treatment beds, more emergency pods, more safe injection sites and we must redouble our efforts to become a community where everyone, no matter what challenges they are facing has a path to a hopeful future and a hand in getting there. And third, we have to confront the fact that our neighbors who are people of color often have a very different relationship with the police and with the criminal justice system than do middle class white folks. This has to end and I look forward to supporting the leaders who are already working hard to dismantle the centuries old structures that perpetuate racism in our society. There are no easy answers for how we get out of this hole that we've dug for ourselves. What I do know is that I refuse to take sides because this is what got us into this mess in the first place. We backed into corners and failed to work together. There's a big difference though between taking sides and taking action. We desperately need our city council to take action together with regional and state partners on solving Burlington's public safety crisis. I will listen to everyone, do my homework, dig into the evidence and then take action having built a broad coalition of partners along the way. I've spent most of my time tonight talking about public safety for two reasons. The first is how important this issue is for Burlington. And the second is that if we can figure out public safety, we can figure out anything. Once we relearn how to trust each other and to work together, the sky's the limit. On top of the public safety crisis, we're also facing a crisis of affordability. Reasonably priced homes are too few and taxes are too high. I'm a city planner by training and a community organizer by vocation. So I know how city plans and zoning codes can be put to work for Burlington. If we rezone the South End Innovation District and turn parking lots into neighborhoods, we will bring new homes onto the market and drive down people's tax bills in one fell swoop. This is a crisis that I know we can solve and many of the tools are already in our hands. And finally, we are facing the global crisis of a destabilization of our planet's climate. I'm proud to be the first Vermont candidate to be endorsed by Run On Climate and I've been working for years to help make our city's transportation system more sustainable. While I know we cannot solve this crisis on our own, we are a brave little city. From bike lanes to heat pumps to electric buses, we can and will make climate action a shared project of our community that our grandchildren will be proud of. My name is Jason Van Draysch. I fiercely believe that everyone deserves a safe community, a roof over their head and a hopeful future. Let's work together to make that happen. Thank you. Thank you very much, Jason. Thank you for joining our caucus and congratulations on your nomination. Our next and final candidate up is Lenora Travis and in the spirit of collaboration, I believe that we have Fareed here to nominate Lenora. Fareed, can I turn it back to you? Thanks, Ben. And I just wanna say how impressed I've been with the process. My first damn caucus was 2019 and it's such a different... I showed up with a bunch of tenants and workers were not set up to allow us to express our voice. But now it's organizers or together a very inclusive process and accommodating people who have to work full-time and who normally wouldn't be able to. And which is why I'm also really happy to introduce Lenora, who I met last time when we both ran against each other. Lenora, I found her to be a very conscientious neighbor. She has a lived experience that we all can learn from and conviction. And locally, she's only been here for a few years, but has already made a lot of difference in the homeless community and also among the veterans in trying to save Memorial Auditorium. And I do like having more working-class candidates and hope that this is a trend that will continue. So I will let Lenora speak now. Thank you. Thank you very much, Farid. Your connection was breaking up a little bit there. I would like to thank you. Thank you very much, Farid. I would like to nominate Lenora. Yeah, I can't hear you. I'm sorry, Farid. Your connection was breaking up a little bit there, but we got two things out of it. So I would like to nominate Lenora. Yes, okay. We've received the nomination for Lenora Travis. I don't know that we see Lenora here in the participant list at this point in time. I do know that Lenora works evenings and nights though. So I'm sorry that we may not have been able to accommodate her schedule. I don't see her here, but I do know from speaking to her earlier that she does accept your nomination and certainly congratulate and appreciate Lenora's participation as well. Farid, unless you know otherwise that Lenora is joining us now, I think we would proceed from here. All right. I don't anyway like seeking rewards. I'm going to, I'm going to go see her and help her with the, with the, with the zoom. Okay. So that'd be fine for you. If you want to reach out by phone. I'm going to walk over. It's like, it's right. Yeah. That's fine. And we can, we can turn back. All right. So I do know that Lenora, however, accepts the nomination and if we have an opportunity for her to be able to join, we certainly want to be able to accommodate her work schedule. I know that she works evenings and nights. So ballots are out as we've let folks know, but we will pause the, the South district caucus potentially to return to it. If Lenora is able to join us. Thank you very much to all the candidates again, as mentioned, virtual ballots have been delivered to folks. If people do not have their ballot in their inbox, or delivered to them by phone as of yet, please email burlington dams at gmail.com. We'll now move from the South district to the East district. In the East district, we have one candidate, which is Maya Brent. And I believe to nominate Maya. We have former city counselor at Adrian. Ed, can I turn to you? Absolutely. Thanks, Ben. It is my pleasure to rise tonight and nominate Maya brand. You know, I just got to know Maya recently in person. I know I think she sent me a couple of emails when I was a city counselor, but when I met her and I saw her presence at some of the meetings that we were at, she actually reminded me a lot of Becca ballot in her ability to connect with people. And that is something that is really difficult to do. And for all of the issues that the Burlington city council deals with, for all of the things that the news gloms on to, in my humble opinion, the most important thing that a city counselor can do is constituent service. And I sincerely believe that Maya is going to be excellent at engaging with the community, the community, the community, the community, the community, the community, talking to constituents, seeing what their needs are, and serving the voters of the East district. So it's my pleasure to be able to nominate Maya. And that's where I'll leave it. Thanks, man. Thank you so much, Ed. I am honored to be nominated by you. Your years as a city counselor or. As a city counselor, I actively communicated with you and you responded back to me. It was really wonderful to see democracy working. Thank you to Ben. Traverse to Adam roof. And Mayor Weinberger. My name is may a brand. I've had a really exciting week and a half. I've been in the special election for the East district city council seat nine days ago. And this Monday I was sworn into city council. I have learned so much and I'm really, I'm just so pleased and honored to be a part of the democratic party. I've been a 32 year resident of Burlington. I have two children in the school system. I have a two-time faculty member at St. Michael's college and fine art. And I am now, you know, actively involved in this amazing journey of being on city council. I've talked with so many neighbors and learned about real needs. And I bring that to city council. And I'm really excited to be here tonight. Tonight is a major concern for many of my neighbors in wards. One and Ward eight. The, a number of break-ins. The amount of car theft. Of course bicycle theft. It's really through the roof. And our police department. I believe that there's a lot of people involved. So that laws and ordinances can be enforced, but also so that we feel safe in our own city. Burlington is an incredible place to live. And right now many neighbors do not feel safe. I believe that. Chief Murad would be a great leader for the police department. He would be a great leader for the police department. He would be a great leader for the police force with the entire city. On a level of trust and mutual. You know, work. This is work that we need to do together. We get to help shape the kind of police force that Burlington needs and requires. And that's what we're doing now. We're doing that. We're doing that. We're doing that. We're doing that. Growing. And there are changes and needs that. Really need to be addressed. And racial equity. Is very important. And having a police force that is well trained, having police officers who are men and women. With diverse backgrounds. Who are participating. That is part of our community. And that is also part of our infrastructure as a city is absolutely essential. I do believe in the cahoots model and believe that it should. Begin this kind of successful model of police officers working with social services and mental health professionals. And this is the world we're living in. And we need this kind of system now. This is really essential to many people who are suffering. From mental health problems and addiction problems, especially after this very strange period. Of the pandemic. Times are tough and we need to help our neighbors. We need to help our, you know, fellow residents find shelter. And get the help they need. Which. You know, also brings me to the idea of shelter. Burlington desperately needs. Housing. And there are different kinds of. Housing. Needs that we need to build for from shelter. To family housing. As well as. Home ownership. There are different kinds of. Building that Burlington needs to engage in. In order for Burlington to prosper. Right now there are many people who cannot afford an apartment and are moving away. Many people came to Burlington because of the University of Vermont. And then stayed and raised families and found jobs. And for many young people, that's simply not possible right now. One project that is being worked on right now is at the Trinity campus. And the University of Vermont. Is going to develop what was once a college campus into housing for University of Vermont students. And I think that the city. Is happy to work with UVM. To create really green, progressive forward thinking. Buildings that will allow the University of Vermont. To provide great housing. Maybe there could be an electric car share in that building. Or maybe there could be restaurants. But to take care of the needs of. Renters. In particular right now is really dire. So the housing situation. Is. Is tricky. Burlington has a very small footprint. So in order to create adequate housing. There will be a need to build houses that are higher and taller. Much as a housing stock in Burlington. Is very old. My house. Is over 170 years old and much of the downtown Burlington. Rental housing. Is over 120 years old. So to build new housing that is really efficient. Energy efficient. And to build new homes. Electrified moving away from fossil fuels. And having it be. Six, seven stories tall. In places that don't obstruct views. I think would be. Really wonderful. For creating the housing that we need. And. Being environmentally conscious about that. Climate change and climate action is incredibly important. We are seeing around the world. Climate change and the destruction of climate change. Burlington. Is. Really forward thinking and moving toward. You know, a net zero roadmap and moving away from fossil fuels and using sustainable energy. And I'm, I'm proud of Vermont. For all of this work, but we have. More work to do. And this is absolutely crucial moving forward. I think that Burlington has the potential for so much. Prosperity. And we need to share that prosperity with all residents. And. We need to have an amazing forum and which to enact change. And the votes that you place tonight. Are an investment in your community. This is really. It's wonderful that so many people have shown up tonight. And our voting. The Democratic party is. Doing so well. We need. To. Have more people in city council to enact positive change. Thank you so much. And I. Again, I'm so grateful to the Democratic party for. Setting this up. Thank you. Thanks very much, Matt. Congratulations on your recent election. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for having me at the council meeting earlier this week. And I'm glad that after one meeting, you're still with us. So congratulations. On. Yes. War. The East district, of course, is made up of both wards one and eight. And as mentioned at the top of the caucus. Whereas. Normally these would be just the district elections next town meeting day. We're excited to have Hannah King. Back as our, as our nominee. And we have every here to nominate Hannah King. I should mention that in these uncontested races, we did give the contest itself district races a bit more time for these uncontested races. Emmett, we will turn to you for a one minute nominating speech and then. Hannah, four minutes to you. So. Emmett, the floor is yours. Thank you for being here. Hi there. Thanks, Ben. Thank you everyone for coming out. My name is Emmett every. I grew up in. In North Central Vermont. Now our resident before they eat here in Burlington. And actually nearly live next door to Hannah, but I didn't know that when I first met her this spring. When we worked together on representative elect Becca balance campaign. And it's been really clear to me since I first met her that she really cares about the city and about our community here in Ward eight. In the neighborhood. And I know that she'll be ineffective. And. I'm dedicated city counselor representative for our community here. And I'm just proud to nominate her as our democratic nominee for Ward eight. Thank you very much, Emmett. Hannah. Congratulations on your nomination. We'll turn to you. Great. Thank you. Hi everyone. My name is Hannah King and I'm proud to be running. Once again for the ward eight city council seat. Thank you to the Burlington democratic party for organizing today's caucus. It's great that so many of our neighbors are watching and voting today. Thank you. Emmett for your nomination and support. I'm so grateful to have you on my team. It's great that so many of our neighbors are watching and voting today. I'm so grateful to have you on my team. It's bittersweet to be here today. I won't lie. I am disappointed that word eight has been put in a position where we're having this special election. I am excited. However, to once again connect with my neighbors and every corner of our community. And seek their support for my candidacy. I've spoken openly about how my background in years of consistent service has led me to where I am today. I'm proud of my roots in more date. I'm the daughter of a single mother who works as a healthcare worker. And my father was a construction worker. The lived experiences of my family have served as the foundation to my commitment to pushing. Actionable forward thinking progressive policy forward. I truly understand the struggle. So many of my ward eight neighbors face because I've lived them myself. I'm running for city council to be a representative leader that listens and is responsive. Is thoughtful in my approach to solving complex problems. And frankly just puts real progress before politics as usual. I believe we can solve our deepest challenges through working together and listening to each other. I've worked tirelessly on behalf of our ward eight neighborhood. Serving as a steering committee member on the wards one and eight neighborhood planning assembly. And as the ward eight representative on the community development block grant advisory board. Through these roles, I've had the opportunity to help expand language access in some of our community's most important events. Such as organ such as assisting in organizing Vermont's first live translated mayoral forum. As well as working to strengthen relationships between students and long-term Burlington residents by creating a pen pal program to encourage productive dialogue within board eight. Over the last year, I've had the honor to serve as the finance director on congresswoman elect Becca balance historic campaign. Working with senator ballot was an experience that taught me so much about staying strong in the face of tough politics, leading with your values and showing up even when times get hard. As many of you know, I've run for the seat before after coming up short last time. I wasn't sure if I'd want to run again. I didn't know that ward eight would be left without representation so soon after that election. Frankly, it was upsetting not only as a former candidate, but also as a resident of ward eight. But what I can promise our community today is that I am someone who will stick by the responsibilities I am seeking. By receiving this nomination tonight and becoming a city counselor this spring. Ward eight neighbors deserve a counselor who is willing to serve them. Someone who sticks around even when circumstances get tough. And over the last five years, I've proven to be that person and I'm prepared to serve. I'm looking forward to a productive and meaningful campaign cycle and hope you'll nominate me as your Democratic candidate for the ward eight city council seat. Thank you. Thank you very much, Hannah, and congratulations on securing the nomination again. And I see Andrew champagne behind you there as well. We will now go ahead and close the east district and the ward eight caucuses. Again, virtual ballots are out if folks have not received their ballot. I'll just remind you and I'll give this information a couple more times to email Burlington Dems at gmail.com or please feel free to call 802-777-3255. I do see that we have our fourth south district candidate here. Lenora Travis and do want to certainly accommodate Lenora's work schedule. So I will reopen the south district caucus and Lenora, if you can hear me, thank you very much for being here and would just love it if you could give us a few brief remarks. As I'm sure you know, for read nominated you, congratulations and your nomination and would love to hear from you. Thank you. Sorry, Lenora, you have to unmute yourself. But Lenora, I'm sorry you're muted. I'm sorry. I was a pop. Can you hear me now? Yes, thank you for being here. Yes, thank you. I appreciate you working with me like this. I'm just closing the store up. So I did, like I said, I didn't think they would give me two days off. I had to be at my BFW the other night. So it's good to be here. It's good to be running again. I feel good. As you know, you and I ran last year and we kind of knew each other's topics and stuff and everything. So I think it's really important. I think it's very important that there's four of us now. And, you know, there's a lot of topics out there. A lot of things that, you know, we need to stay focused on. And I've basically running on the same things as I did last year. Affordable housing. Is very important. I think it's very important to get, especially since I have been in this area now, I've seen a lot more on hand. And I think venue and I've talked about this. You know, I've talked about the shelters. And all of the things that are happening around here with people in the neighborhood that are disappointed because of stuff that they're seeing and that they're having to deal with. So I do think it's like priority that we try to find other places to put a lot of the homeless. Because in a community like this, for some reason, a lot of people, it's not working for them. They're talking about their taxes going up. They're talking about their life and, you know, on paying taxes and stuff. And I have to look at people stumbling around on the sidewalk or people getting into fights and 911 down there every day. So I've seen it, you know, front up in front up and personal. So that's another thing I'd like to, you know, work on. I'd also like to work on. Making sure that there's not just affordable housing, but I'd like to make sure that landlords are kept to be held responsible for a lot of things that go on in the places that you're renting. There is some issues in the building where I'm renting right now and it is a health mental issue. And I shouldn't have to live where I'm paying to rent and I'm not the only person that's dealing with this. A lot of people are just renting just because it's a state check. They're not renting because this person is going to get along with people in the building and be, you know, respectful to each to one another. So that's another thing that I want to talk about. The police, we definitely need more police. It's, it's a must. I mean, I can't even get help when I have a problem here at the store, because when I call, they'll tell me they're short handed. They can't come for me to file a complaint online, which is bizarre to me at my age to have to file something online when I'm a police officer. So making sure that we have more police officers is a must. I think it also coincides with, if we get police back like we were six years ago when I saw them everywhere and walking church street and there was never, you know, there was always a police officer in sight. It might cut down on some of the theft and stuff that's happening because these people out here know that the cops are not going to come. I've had so many thefts in here and every time I call, one time a police officer came and when that person got here, she got here after everything had already disputed. The person was gone, the merchandise was gone, and with it. So they know that, you know, the police are short handed and that they're not going to touch them. So, you know, like I said, there's a lot to say. I believe that all of us have, you know, certain projects that we want to be worked on and certain goals that we'd like to reach or that we'd like to see Burlington reach. And I'm more than willing to work with people and try to get some things done to make Burlington back to what it was when I saw it six years ago. It wasn't a lot of this stuff happening. So I appreciate you very much taking the time to listen to me and to wait for me tonight. That was very nice of you. And I wish everybody the best and Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. God bless. Thank you very much to Nora. Thank you for participating in our caucus and congratulations on your nomination. We will now go ahead and close the south district caucus. That leaves two additional caucuses and two additional candidates before we wrap up the evening. We will move now to call the central district caucus to order where we have one candidate for central district city council, Avery music car and to nominate Avery. We have Tiki Arshambo. Tiki, can I turn to you? Great. I'm just going to do a reality check. Can you hear me okay? We sure can. Excellent. Just like to make sure before I get into it. Thank you. So happy to join tonight. And especially glad and honored to be able to nominate Avery music car for city council central district. Admittedly, I've not known every terribly long, but from the short time that I have known him, I've known him for a long time. I've known him for a long time. I've known him for a long time. What I've found is a lot of energy. I'm sorely needed. I've also seen with that humility. I think that's a positive trait and a candidate. He's got the passion that we need. I think he's, he's into civility. And that's kind of funny to say it nowadays, but civility is kind of important. We don't see enough of it. He's got a quest for, for good governance. We don't see enough of it. He's also, I'm going to make clear on this. If anyone knows my own background and that he's progressive. He is progressive minded. And he can talk more about that as he will in a few moments here. And lastly, I think my piece would be, you know, he's going to show up, you know, central districts. I think we can feel the pain show over as Hannah had spoken to earlier where we've just not had the representation show up like it's needed, but John, I think I saw him sing in the same. I've seen him sing in most of the kids who will be singing crucial council meetings. From at a district level. So really excited that Avery has thrown his, hat in the ring here. And I'll, I'll stop there. And I look forward to hearing more about Avery. Thank you very much. Tiki and Avery, congrats on your nomination. We'll turn to you now for formats. Thank you. Thanks Ben and Tiki for the nomination. in Burlington for most of the past decade. And I grew up in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, but I came here first as a UVM student and now as a working professional. I thought I'd start by talking a little bit about why I'm personally running and then dig into some of the issues. A lot of things are going really well in Burlington right now and previous speakers have touched on some of those items were getting progress on the pit at long last. We've taken action on housing and houselessness and a personal victory. For me, we finally have the return of Amtrak in service in New York and a beautiful new Moran plant park near where I live. A lot of folks want to be here. We're at a great point of growth and vibrancy in the city. I also think we're at risk in that department by becoming a more unlivable, more unaffordable and more unsafe. And there are a lot of things we can see all around us that are on the decline of Burlington. Public safety is becoming seriously concerning as many speakers have touched on. Our development is happening, but it's sporadic and it's sprawling with erratic zoning that doesn't make for affordable and accessible housing as much as we'd like it to. Our public infrastructure is not in good shape from potholes to sidewalks. Our city is not very accessible. And I think most importantly, the trust in our public process is at a really low ebb. We don't have a shared sense of ownership in our city government. And we have increasing hostility and instability in the way that we're engaging with each other. As a progressive, I'm really disappointed with my supposedly progressive representation in city council. There was one particular city council meeting I remember in particular where a woman shared her experience as a survivor of sexual assault and was advocating for a dedicated unit in the police department to advocate for that. And many of the progressive folks who were also there to speak actively shouted her down. And I think if we're at that sort of place in our public discourse, as we're dealing with some of the most important issues and crises of our time, we are not able to function in a productive way. And I also am indignant at the fact that many who claim to speak for all progressives also claim to speak for marginalized and underprivileged communities exclusively while actively causing harm through their refusal to work productively and communicate across difference to the folks who may have different views while sharing a lot of the same principles and goals. As far as actual issues, I think my primary interest is in transparency and engagement in our public process. Our ideals and goals involve spending a lot of money. And when we ask Wellington residents for their tax dollars, we need to be accountable to where it's going, why it's necessary and how that money is being spent. Being able to give folks a receipt for where their tax money goes and have them have a shared sense of pride and ownership in the many things that we're achieving. We also need to be responsive to our actual residents, not to the loudest voices in the room who often don't speak for many folks but themselves. And we need to make sure that all voices are heard as city council and in our public decision-making. Many speakers have touched on public safety tonight and I don't wanna spend too much time on it, but we would all love to live in a society where police are not necessary. And we'd all like to believe, and I think this is true to a great degree that with ample social services, holistic mental health care and economic welfare programs, violence and harm would greatly disappear in our society. Unfortunately, that's not where we are today. We've seen public safety significantly degrade over the last few years with no substitute for the enforcement mechanisms that we're removing. We also need to have realistic expectations about what we ask of a police department today. We're asking folks to be both law enforcers, mental health technicians, social workers. They're asked to do about five different professions at once. And so we need to think about a robust, holistic and all-encompassing public safety infrastructure in Burlington that includes the aspect of law enforcement that we require to keep everybody safe while also making sure that we're engaging in the preventive mechanisms that can reduce the need for that enforcement in the first place. We all agree on certain fundamental principles. We all want more accountability. We all want more oversight. And we all want greater professionalism in our police force. So we need to be able to work together in a way that involves stability and compromise to actually make that happen rather than sloganeering and signwaving. We need to be focused on the long slog of actual city governance and productive change. As a renter, I'm deeply concerned with the housing crisis in Burlington. We need to be focused on long-term sustainable development that includes developing with smart rezoning in the actual city and not pushing folks out to the suburbs where they're increasingly dependent on cars in order to be able to work downtown. We also need to have reasonable urban planning that is conscious of the fact that we have vibrant neighborhoods that need to be maintained and we need to prevent gentrification but we also need to modernize and be aware that there are certain significant changes we need to make for Burlington to be sustainable in its growth phase. We also need to address the houselessness crisis in a more serious way. It is not compassionate to leave folks who are experiencing intense crisis on our streets without proper intervention. On climate, I'm passionate about making substantive changes in the city while minimizing punitive measures that actually turn many voters off from the initiatives that they would agree with if we were more focused on incentives for good behavior rather than punishing the things that we're trying to change. On transport, this is something I'm very passionate about. I had the privilege to live in Europe for a few years where there are very well-funded and well-developed public infrastructure projects. I believe that that's a big factor behind social unity. I previously lived in London which is an incredibly diverse and vibrant city. Everybody rides the tube, everyone rides the train to work and there's a certain amount of social cohesion that comes from that which we really lack here. There's no reason why Burlington can't have a world-class public infrastructure and transit system that makes it something people actually want to use rather than a last resort because they have no other option. In general, we could do so much to build actual meaningful public infrastructure in this city which brings people together, gives them a shared sense of identity and gives them a sense of pride in all the things we are working for and paying to achieve. So I thank you all for your time tonight. I look forward to a productive and substantive campaign and that's about all I have. Thank you. Thank you very much, Avery. Thank you so much for stepping up and for joining our caucus and congratulations on your nomination. We will now close the Central District Caucus and we will call our last but not least caucus to order which is the caucus for the North District where we have one candidate, Mark Barlow and thrilled to have here with us to nominate Mark, Representative Carol Odie. Representative Odie, we turn to you to nominate Mark. Thank you. I'm looking for my notes. Sorry, they're not showing up. Well, I'll have to wing it. So Mark, I'm very happy to nominate Mark who has risen to the challenge of serving us on the city council and who is up to continue serving in these challenging times. He works with, closely with Democrats on the council and with all city councillors and he shares neighborhood priorities of public safety, affordability and economic development. I'm very pleased to endorse this candidacy. Thank you very much, Representative Odie. Mark, congratulations on your nomination. We'll turn it to you. Thank you, Carol. And thank you, Burlington Democrats for allowing me the opportunity to ask for your support tonight. For almost two years, I've served as North District's independent city councillor. Throughout my term, I've had friendly and respectful relationships with all my fellow councillors but I've had particularly strong working relationships with democratic councillors. I talk with Councillor Carpenter at least weekly and we work as a team to serve the interests of our shared New North Bend constituency. Councillor Shannon and I continue to work on public safety issues and I'm creating conditions that will allow us to rebuild our police department as quickly as possible. And I certainly hope she prevails tonight and will remain on the council. Councillor Travers and I worked closely for months on the redistricting effort that recently concluded. And I've been supportive and appreciative of Council President Paul's focus on making the council meetings run more efficiently and effectively and whenever possible less contentiously. And I'll continue to support her in that effort. In addition to the good working relationships I have with council Democrats, I also have worked to get Democrats elected. Most recently, Councillor Brandt and her Easterster run and Senator Lett-Gulick in her campaign and during the subsequent recount. So I'm here tonight to ask for your support in my reelection. If re-elected, I'll continue to work closely with Burlington Democrats on our shared priorities and do the work necessary to address public safety needs, support businesses and promote economic health and to address the affordability crisis for city residents. Thank you for considering my, an endorsement of my candidacy. And I look forward to talking with many of you in the coming weeks. Thank you very much, Mark. We will now close out the North District Caucus and that brings us to the conclusion of the end of our nominating caucus. Again, in the South District, we received nominations for Joan Shannon, Fareed, Jason Ben-Dresch and Lenora Travis. In the East District, Mayor Brandt and Ward 8, Hannah King, in the Central District, Avery Muzakar, in the North District, Mark Barlow. Thanks again are owed to Adam Roof, our Democratic Party Chair and other volunteers who helped put this evening's caucus together. Thanks are owed to Town Meeting TV, as always for being such an essential community resource. Thank you to Mayor Morrow-Weinberger for joining us this evening. Thank you to all of our candidates and their supporters for taking part in this caucus. With candidates like those present here, the future of our city is bright. I'm confident in that. And we appreciate the more than 1,000 of you who contributed to that future by joining our caucus. Again, ballots are out. I will share my screen once more with the information for anyone who is struggling to find their ballots or needs help with voting. Virtual ballots have been delivered. Should be in folks inboxes. If they provided a phone number, should receive text messages with a link as well. If anyone has any trouble, burlingtondams.com or call 802-777-3255. Ballots will be open until 9.30 p.m. And we will post the results as soon as possible thereafter. Again, thanks very much for joining us. Thank you for joining our caucus and for participating. Hope folks are bundled up and ready for the storm that seems to be coming this evening and look forward to being in touch with you soon. Good night.