 All right. Here we go. Welcome. I'm so excited to be here with all of you and be celebrating the grand reopening of City Hall Park. It feels like we have just a little break in the weather here. In general, I'm blaming Doreen for this and her desire to see the interactive storm water art exhibit working fully. At least that's a benefit from it. But sorry we don't have better weather for you but we got a lot else. Let's dive right in. And let me do just say if people can't be mindful of, I see almost, I see everyone's got masks on. We're all going to have our masks on except when we're speaking. Thank you for that. Try to keep distance between yourself. We've got a big enough space here. I think we can do it. So here we go. In her seminal book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs revealed the rarely-munchened, unfortunate truth that many parks fail to achieve the promise that they represent. For every vibrant city park, she observed, there are dozens of dispirited city vacuums called parks eaten around with decay, little used, unloved. To be great spaces, she wrote, city parks, quote, need the boon of life conferred upon them. That was the core problem we were trying to solve with the transformation of this park, to give it more life. For many years, City Hall Park was amazing on summer Saturdays with the farmers market here and much of the rest of the time it was dramatically underused. The park's design and amenities did not draw people into it. Soils were eroded and compacted and the lighting and lack of activity left many potential park users with a sense of unease and they didn't come in. We could see that there are ways that improving the design could help City Hall Park both withstand better the times of heavy use and be more welcoming for other types of uses too. We knew we could create features that would help more people enjoy it from spaces and amenities to support eating and small gatherings throughout the day, to improve accessibility, to a fountain that would be a destination for families, to more benches so that people could sit and talk to a range of different spaces for music and cultural programming. This was the opportunity that the community called on us to make good on in 2011 during the Imagine City Hall Park public engagement process led by Burlington City Arts that involved hundreds of members of the public. We knew it wouldn't be easy. There had been prior efforts to address these issues over the decades that had not been successful and sure enough over the years since this administration committed to getting this done we faced many challenges. Soil conditions drove up the cost dramatically resolving important decisions about trees and expanding sidewalk and event hard surface areas added time and brought some controversy. When in the summer of 2018 after eight years of active planning the City Council made the decision to send this project back to a new committee to consider design changes again. There were a lot of people who doubted that this would ever happen that we would ever get to today. However we stuck with it. We addressed the rising costs by finding new philanthropic and institutional funding sources and taking some of the work in-house and doing so in a way that kept the cost of taxpayers under a million dollars. We sustained the will and focus and today we know that it was worth it. At long last we have a public space at the physical and cultural heart of Burlington that is alive that is worthy of this great community and that is accessible and welcoming to all. A park that is truly built for everyone. So you know having addressed some of the project history I just want to reflect a little longer on this present moment. We are gathered today seven months into a pandemic. We are wearing masks. We are keeping physical distance from each other. We are going about our daily lives in ways we never imagined at this time last year. We have plans to use this new space in the remaining months of this pandemic which we hope are short to keep our downtown vibrant and to help sustain the many small businesses and organizations that are facing massive challenges right now. As people start to experience this revitalized park I hope we'll serve as a beacon of renewal and remind us that there will be life on the other side of this pandemic and that our city will get through this and truly not just rather truly will be stronger on the other side. Finally the history of pandemics suggests that once we do get to that other side it will quickly become hard to remember the loss the uncertainty and the dramatic disruption of our lives that COVID has wrought. That is why today I am dedicating the park renovations to the Burlington residents who we have lost to this coronavirus. We have a plaque here that is going to be installed just on the other side of the plaza that will be permanently installed and I'd like to read it to you here's what it says. A comprehensively redesigned city hall park reopened after a year of construction amidst the largest global pandemic in 100 years. At the time of the opening the city had been living under emergency order for more than six months. Masks were required in all public spaces and group gatherings were severely restricted. This park renovation is dedicated to the Burlingtonians who died as a result of the novel COVID-19 coronavirus. In the years to come as children play in jets of water and crowds assemble to enjoy each other and our city's great music, food and events. Let us never forget that these joyous scenes are fragile and that their continuation can only be guaranteed through an ongoing vigilant commitment to public health and to science. We are joined today I believe if you could raise your hands by Ross Farnsworth the director of the Burlington Health and Rehab and Alicia DiMario. Ross and Alicia they're in the back. Alicia I may have like to say is the director of Birchwood Terrace and thank you for joining us today and I hope you will convey to all the families who have lost the lost loved ones in the early months of the pandemic that we are thinking of them in their loss today. Finally I'd like to close by a pretty substantial round of acknowledgments. You don't have a project that takes this long and involves this much effort that doesn't require taking the time to thank a lot of people and I'm gonna I'm gonna try to do that here. I'm sure we won't quite get everyone but we are gonna thank a bunch of people. First of all I want to thank the city team. This project has been a feat of cross departmental collaboration that goes beyond I think anything else we've undertaken together in the last in the last eight plus years and it includes the parks, recreational waterfront department, Burlington city arts, the department of public works and the water resources division of DPW in particular involves CEDO and the office of city planning and there are certainly things that had that the city attorney's office spent a lot of time with basically just about everyone in every department ended up playing an important role before this was done. I'm particularly grateful to Laura Wheelock engineer and project manager extraordinaire for steering this project through complicated soils remediation work. Where is Laura? Thank you Laura. And for delivering this project Laura I think it's important to say on time and on budget but for the delays caused by the pandemic itself this construction proceeded exactly as it was supposed to and how many other city projects you actually see the budget coming down over the course of construction. I haven't seen it before thank you for what you did. I want to thank and we're going to hear from in a moment Vijay Komai who on his very first days on the job as city arborist plunged right into the controversy had to go to public meetings to speak about the trees in this park the passion of Vijay and his team have contributed immeasurably to this project and even and he helped in ways as well that helped deal with the budget challenges taking some of the work for the plantings and the trees in house he's been out here day after day in recent months getting ready for this beautiful opening. Thank you Vijay and thank you for your whole team. I want to thank the rest of the parks team who put great care into thinking through how to maintain this park and keep it as welcoming as it is today not just an opening day but every day going forward and who and the water resources team who I mentioned they work to ensure that the project would sustainably improve storm water management in our downtown core it's a big issue right in the core the management of storm water and these beautiful gardens around us are not just pretty they're not just here to to enhance the experience of being here they also play an important function in protecting Lake Champlain and I want to thank the Burlington City Arts team for their thought about how to bring this park alive through arts and cultural programming. There are so many partners that played a role in getting to today and helped build support for the project and shape it in important ways over time I want to call out the Preservation Trust of Vermont and AARP for being key partners and I particularly want to recognize the Burlington Business Association and Kelly Devine. Kelly where are you? There she is Kelly for all that you did throughout the history of this project to get us today and in true partnership to make this an important part a successful part of downtown. This project has involved vision and technical skill from designers architects and contractors thank you to Wagner Hodgson, Sussman, Land Shapes, S.D. Ireland, Du Bois and King, Wait, Hendo and others. We wouldn't have gotten today without the support of generous private donors who helped add important features to this park and without whose help we wouldn't we wouldn't it would be a very different place I particularly want to thank Tony Palmerlow we're thinking of him today and we have Ernie Palmerlow here who in his own right has been a great champion of this project and so many others and who we'll be hearing from in a moment we're so thankful for the civic commitment of the Palmerlow family and I also want to thank the PCOR family which made an important contribution to get us over the final financial hurdles as well so thank thank you to all those partners and all that team I sorry I two other important bodies that played a key role in getting us today making this project better the city council was highly engaged in this project from start to center to finish I see Councillor Mason here with us who went through every step of the way over the last eight years thank you Councillor Mason I'm sure I can't I haven't seen her yet but I'm sure councillor is councillor Paul if she is councillor Paul here she if she isn't here in person she's here in spirit and has played a great role rounding up philanthropic contributions for some of the benches that are here if any other city council that can't quite see with the mask the umbrellas can you raise your hand I see new city council Sarah Carpenter is here and we have Franklin Paulino here as well and Brian Pine is standing there in the back thank you Brian for being here Brian was on the inside on the city team when this started and played a role then thank you to the city council for the partnership and thank thank you to the Burlington Parks Commission which also played a key role and I believe Nancy Kaplan who is the chair for some critical years and was a great champion this project is also here so one more time let's have a big round of applause for all the partners that got us today so now I will turn the podium over to someone who has seen the potential of this project from the very beginning who went out and got a big grab from the national and down to the arts to get this process the match into the all-part process kicked off in 2011 the great Doreen Kraft fun what fun thank you morrow um there probably isn't a person here today who's standing who doesn't need to be thanked if anyone is ever overlooked in these gatherings please know that you are deeply with us because it did take a village to bring this beautiful civic space to life though discussed informally for some years it was in 2010 that a group of citizens neighbors business owners and park lovers finally declared that city hall park was not serving its purpose as the central public plaza and green space in the downtown of Burlington there was deterioration and neglect in a space that many thought was the gateway to our city and we knew we could and must do better with oversight from the city administration the Burlington business association parks department police department preservation trust of Burlington king street center tom levitt then at the merchants bank now at northfield savings bank ernie pomerlo and his family along with an army of dedicated citizens who formed a task force to commit our energy to realizing a park that better represented the natural beauty cultural compassion and diversity of Burlington funded with a grant from the nea imagine city hall park was a nine month engagement process that leveraged art as a driving force collecting the multifarious needs designs and ideas that our community had and distilled them with an abundance of creativity into a single space with rain garden storm water mitigation expanded access interactive installations historical preservation and flexible event space that is available to every single citizen i think we then have more than achieved our goal this park is beyond beautiful even in the rain in the midst of the pandemic and a long overdue national conversation on racial equity i have come to more deeply appreciate our parks and wildways the green spaces throughout our urban core our parks are who we are they bring us together to converse to play to relax and to consider ways forward in shaping the future i am so proud that this public civic space is blessed with the intentions of thousands of burlingtonians and vermoners but our work on city hall park is still unfinished the park is and should remain a work in progress one that will need us and generations to follow to nurture it to engage it to protect it so that it continue to tell the ever progressing story of who we are as a city in closing i want to thank a few more people i want to thank sarah cats for my team who is in charge of the public art installations and the gorgeous work that you will take a tour on today with cat clear tessa o'brien artist i want to thank zack williams and uh his team for all that you have done to create spaces in this park that will allow many many types of public engagement and display i want to thank heather ferrell because now for the gallery the bca center gallery this is a new backyard and a much larger responsibility of what that gallery will mean to this city park i want to thank the water wheel found beth montorey rolls thank you so much for your amazing leadership and contribution to making this park possible and to my board members and leadership lori roe and france stoddard you're amazing to all my colleagues i love you hello everybody i'm tom levitt i'm president of northfield savings bank i grew up at 1888 north avenue berlington vermont then it was 05401 now 05408 and uh i had the pleasure of standing here at this location on the occasion of our nation's uh bicentennial with uh mayor gordon pockett as he dedicated a brand new city park fountain and i was with my girlfriend now my wife of many years diane just freshly out of burlington high school so the seahorse spirit lives um and if we live again in a beautiful new space that came to be because of our community citizens and many community investors and i'm delighted to be here with urney today um as one of those key investors in this project but it really took so many hands over that 10-year period i want to thank kelly divine and the burlington business association for their leadership for the way they rally the best in business principles we are all corporate citizens as we stand here in this great city and this gem this treasure is is brought about because we have vital business in the city of burlington because we have people that are employers and paying taxes and providing capital to the city so that all can be included and that we can all stand here today and celebrate such a beautiful asset to our community it is our front yard i think that the vitality of this park going forward is really going to be important the fact that we do want it to be safe we want it to be healthy we want it to be totally inclusive so northfield savings bank i'm proud to have some of our team members here uh will be underwriting programming in this park not only this fall but all through next year to make sure we're reaching out to community organizations across the spectrum here in burlington bringing these young people and some not so young to the park so they can showcase their soul so they can showcase their creativity in their arts here in this space so i am very proud to be affiliated with that effort to have northfield savings bank as a good neighbor across the street being part of this not only today but in the future a healthy city hall park equals a healthy burlington so thank you all and thank you mayor weinberger for your leadership hi i'm kathryn monstream and i have a gallery across the way and i'm a painter and if we were at a wedding today we would say that this is really good luck because the gods are crying tears of joy as we all are um what i love about this space is there is room for everyone at this park there are new corners nooks more benches there's perennial gardens and the orientation of all the structures is so welcoming to locals and visitors alike and to me i don't know why but it looks bigger i don't does everybody think it looks bigger it's now a true destination something i probably wouldn't have said before and it's just what a great city like burlington needs a true city hall park we can be proud of it now and when friends and family come to visit we will take them to the waterfront church street we'll be down at the maran plant maybe the uh 40 foot um filing cabinet but now this will be part of our tour when we bring people here and it will be a great place for people to visit when the first designs were proposed some folks resisted and what i think we forget is that shelter and farms isn't naturally beautiful and you're like of course it is it's this gorgeous swath of land on the lake shores of lake champlain but every tree every shrub every curve of the road was planned and designed so while Frederick Olson wasn't available we were lucky to have the good design and creative eye of Wagner hudson who put together this amazing design solid landscape architecture and that's what we needed to reimagine this space is true design personally we are so lucky we across the street we look out on the from the gallery we have big windows and we see the silver maple and watching this progress has been incredible we're sort of like little kids at a construction site each day looking a new palette of rocks the sod trucks when the trucks came with grass we were like just jumping for joy so it's been really surprisingly pleasant to be a business on the perimeter of this park during this transition um i want to thank the city for making that effort because certainly we had some hesitation about what would it be like during this for our little business and i think all of us would agree that the the parking was sort of maintained as best it could it was relatively dust free and entertaining every day so i'm really grateful for all the work that happened to make uh our businesses um be able to stay open and um i also i think my family for being here today tour silly nails and my husband al because this has been like their playground and now we haven't been able to come here and i can't wait to buy them a lunch have a picnic i promise the murals from kkd thank you hi i'm jeff hodson from wagner hodson landscape architecture city hall park has evolved since the late 1800s when it was pretty much just a and a green and over the decades chris crossing paths were added at least two different fountains have lived in this park and um you know while both while modifying a beloved park is not always the easiest job to take on um it's definitely one of the most satisfying um and we've really enjoyed the process and are really happy with with the results i want to mention amy houghton is in the audience she was the project manager for our office thank you amy for everything um some of the the new park features i wanted to point out making the the park more accessible was was always a big goal and um we were able to achieve that through shifting walkways around um we improved greatly the ecological health of the park there were a lot of contaminated soils in the park they were replaced um aerated the trees we added over um 600 shrubs and 900 perennials and introduced a lot of new tree species and also the rain gardens that have been mentioned they can handle i think it's 90 of the rainfall that happens that falls on the park and it also treats uh half of st paul street so um that's really important for the for the city because it takes that that capacity out of the combined sewer system and it allows the water to recharge into the soil the high efficiency lighting that we've put in through the park adds safety and atmosphere um and the seating options we've added a lot of seat walls benches but also movable furniture which in these covid times is turning out to be even more important than we ever realized and also the portland lou the bathroom um a very uh high-tech prefab well thought out amenity for the park before i go i just want to thank the countless city staff that helped make this possible and like morrow said it was almost every department i think um but also the contractors and subcontractors that took you know a 70 page uh 70 sheet construction set and brought it to life uh creating this park they were amazing to work with s drland landscapes and uh john turner consulting so thank you very much hi i'm vj home i and i am the city arborist um as mayor wineberger said my very first day on the city payroll was the first drb meeting reviewing the plans for this park it was a packed house um i immediately found myself at the center of what would become a very long and very spirited debate about the future of this park i learned some things very quickly that night the first thing i learned was why my predecessor decided to retire when he did yeah i'm laughing now i also learned that burlington residents are really really passionate about their public spaces but at the same time i learned that the city team that had been working on this project for years before i got here that as has been said involved people from departments across the city were equally as passionate about our public spaces and were committed to making this park the best that it could be in the weeks and months that followed that first meeting i spent a great deal of time in this park evaluating the health of the existing trees i studied the plans for the park's reconstruction i did a lot of research on my own i met regularly with the whole city team and the design team and i listened very closely to all the concerns that were being raised in the public process i ultimately came to the realization from an ecological standpoint that this park was failing badly it was quite sick many of the existing trees were in severe decline and it had been in decline for years the soils throughout much of the park were very compacted and were degrading by the year and with each passing storm and my agenda throughout this process was to ensure that the plans to redesign this park would address the issues that had led to the park's decline over time and that ultimately the work that we did here would strike a balance between the public use of the space and the long-term ecological health and sustainability of the park for generations to come fortunately i've been in this business i've been in this profession for more than 30 years i started when i was like six um we've learned a lot in 40 years through science and research we've learned about the importance of mitigating storm water runoff and how to incorporate plants and to build structures to help make that happen we learned about more about the proper planting of trees to ensure their long-term health and which species are best suited to specific sites and urban settings we've learned of new innovations that allow us to incorporate trees in the hardscape areas and provide them with the soil volumes they need to grow to maturity very important we've learned about the importance of having a diversity of species of trees in an urban space as well as a diversity of age classes of trees and we've learned about the importance of supporting the health of our native pollinator populations which have really been known to be suffering in recent years and how to use native plants to supply them with the food and habitat that they need to thrive and survive we believe in science so we incorporated all of what we have learned into the design and reconstruction of the park and i think the results are visible today the ecological health of this park has been restored and and i'm confident that it's been done in such a way that it'll be sustainable and will thrive for future generations and i look forward over the next several years and and hopefully decades watching this park thrive we planted 22 new trees hundreds of new shrubs and 3,345 or 35 perennials and ornamental grasses by completing the plantings with our in-house staff we were able to source all of the shrubs and all the perennials and grasses from two local growers so we supported our local economy at a time when we all know that was probably more important than ever and not only that it greatly reduced our carbon footprint because we weren't trucking these plants in from great distances and the growers we worked with are as passionate as they come and as good as what they do and it's evident in the plants that you see here today a large percentage of the plants and trees are species native to our region and thus they're well suited to the site will support our native pollinators while providing a display of color from may through october the aeration and mitigation of the soils throughout the park in addition to the state of the art irrigation system will ensure the long-term health of the trees and turf it's been a real pleasure for me to be a part of this team to make this happen I've learned a lot you know people from across all departments got to know everybody really quickly but I especially want to acknowledge members of our parks and recreation department they're kind of behind the scenes that help get us here today so there's our park leadership Cindy Cindy White our director and Derek Roche our head of facilities and facilities and maintenance supervisor for their guidance and support along the way to our parks planning team who wait in throughout the design and construction process to our facilities crew who are here the last two weeks fixing you know putting the finishing touches on everything from hanging banners to trash receptacles and all the above they've been training on the new irrigation system and fountain system and its upkeep and maintenance and moving forward they're going to take on that responsibility to our grounds crew who you know has already implemented an intensive program for taking care of the turf in the park and especially to my tree crew who took on this project with me never questioned it brought their passion and expertise every day and they're still talking to me so I'm happy about that so thank you good afternoon my name is Ernie Pamela I'm here with a number of our members of our family to celebrate this moment with all of you and I think it's really important again I know we've done this but Maro your your your efforts and the amazing team around you in the city I need to thank you for your vision but most importantly for your commitment we would not be standing here were it not for that amazing team I go back like Tom I was born here in many of you a few blocks from here to put a little history on it I played in this park when the tickets at the Flynn Theater were 25 cents so we talk about evolution I played here there was a canopy of absolutely exquisite elm trees they went away they were replaced you've heard about different fountains we're in like the fourth generation here this is natural evolution the only constant in life is change and what an exciting time to see this final change the family here is dedicated to one thing to help the park but there's a little memory I wanted to share with you all mom and dad wanted the fountain and the handicapped accessibility and memory of our sister Ann Marie who was a teacher of disabled but she saw the world through a wheelchair and to be able to now have this park she would come and spend time at the farmers market and it was very challenging though the sidewalks were narrow things were rough but so to be able to participate with the community and the city to have a handicapped accessible park of this magnitude and the other fun thing that fountain not only is going to you're going to see in a bit splash park we're getting a little practice now but the splash park for for children but it's accessible to children in wheelchairs and to me that was magic so our little part in this is to enhance that but I wanted to say thank you for everybody here and everybody this has been a long road but one worth traveling thank you well first I want to start off by saying what an honor to be speaking here and representing an organization that I love so much for those who don't know me my name is Mila and I've worked at King Street Center for five years now and one of the many things that made me fall in love with my job is the fact that King Street has always made it a point to be involved in our community as much as possible this park has been part of our daily walks with the toddlers for many years and I don't know exactly know how many times but we definitely have a lot of falls laughs tantrums and lots of moments of curiosity and gross motor exploration in this very park by bringing King Street kids here of all ages it becomes part of their community and in return we hope that it becomes part of the neighborhood their families also come to think of as their own which is a place to gather play and enjoy it is an iconic place in Burlington Vermont and we are extremely excited to be walking the toddlers through here again and a small story we actually walked through here the other day while the fences were still up and one of the toddlers went for a peek through and was like whoa so I think the toddlers approve of the space and thank you thank you Mila all right thank you all for sticking through this in the rain and long program we've got just two things to do to close out our program today um let's say let's actually three quick things to do one these benches help finance the park Doreen anyone who's interested in and helping us get over the final kind of fundraising goal finish line there are still opportunities see Doreen and her her blue piece of information for for more secondly in a moment we're going to get asked for some help in launching the new fountain for the first time officially and we are so happy to have a group from king street here to to help us do that and they've been incredibly patient and done a lot better than I think my kids would have done uh waiting here through this all so we're going to turn over them in one moment and then as soon as that's done I just I hope people will will stay around and we're going to try to do a socially distant group picture Zach Williamson will help us lead us through that so with that let's go to the fountain and our king street students and I get here's where we're going to do it if you can help us we're to uh we're going to count down from 10 together ready