 Hello everyone. My name is Pravesh Sharma. Thank you so much for coming to Burlington City Council candidate climate forum. Climate change is and will be the most important thing to address for us and the future generation. We we we can see the devastation of climate change internationally, nationally, locally and it affects every socioeconomic and political level in every way possible. This forum is designed to question and understand where Burlington City Council candidates stand on climate issues and how they will tackle climate issues that specifically affect the city of Burlington. Now I would like to introduce the candidates. We have Carter Nubisir. I hope I said that name right. He's a progressive from Ward 1. We have Joe Kane. Actually I don't think Joe is here. So Joe is not here. Oh Joe is here. What a timing. We have Joe Kane, progressive from Ward 3. We have Sarah Carpenter, Democrat from Ward 4. Lena Greenberg, independent Ward 5. Ben Travers, Democrat Ward 5. Will Anderson, progressive Ward 6. Lee Morrigan, progressive Ward 7. Merrick Broderick, progressive Ward 8. And lastly Hannah King, Democrat Ward 8. Each now each candidate has two minutes for their opening statements. Holly right here. Holly will be our timer today. So when we are around 90 seconds she will lift up a paper for you to finish your opening statements. And we can get started with Joe. Yeah. All right. Hi everyone. My name is Joe Kane. I'm running for City Council in Ward 3 which is over in downtown over into the Old North End a bit. It's really a full circle moment to be speaking about climate on a college campus. Having been an activist about a decade ago on a college campus in Williamsburg, Virginia. I went to William and Mary. I was active in the divestment movement. I took a climate ride while I was an undergraduate for which I raised a few thousand dollars for 350.org which is where one of the candidates Carter currently works. I'm very passionate about climate issues and I'd like to see them addressed on council even though I'm aware that there are pressing issues. You know the city faces perceived safety issues. You know drug use homelessness issues but I think we can't you know we don't have time to just say that it's complicated to just use rhetoric but we need to take bold action. I think we need to look into network to geothermal. We need to look into bold solutions to you know move past McNeil plant move past biofuels. We need to update our net zero twenty thirty plan and take climate much more seriously than we currently do. I'm endorsed by run on climate. I'm endorsed by Sunrise Champlain Valley. This issue is prominent on my platform and I'm looking forward to the conversation today. Hi everyone. Hi everyone. My name is Hannah King. Thank you to Champlain the student climate collective run on climate in eco reps for hosting today's forum. I'm the daughter of a single mom a mom who has dedicated her life to serving as a health care worker in Union steward. My father was a construction worker someone who worked tirelessly while living with his own deep struggles growing up with three siblings and one parent often created challenges. The realities of my upbringing have instilled in me an unwavering commitment to advocacy and progressive policymaking. I intimately understand the challenges faced by our community because I've walked the same path serving as your ward 8 City Councilor has been nothing short of an honor and a responsibility that I hold dear. I prioritize my constituents views especially in our toughest votes in the face of challenges. Ward 8 deserves leadership that doesn't waiver. I'm here to be that leader to stand by you and to continue working relentlessly for the betterment of our neighborhood. Thank you. Thanks Hannah and thank you and thanks Champlain College and partners for hosting the event. My name is Ben Travers. I'm the current City Councilor for Ward 5. Ward 5 is basically the south end along Pine Street south of Main Street and I'm finishing up my first term in that role. My wife and I moved to Burlington a little more than 10 years ago from Brooklyn. We were renters in the five sisters neighborhood and then decided to start our family and we're lucky enough to be able to purchase our first home in the south end. We now have three small kids and eight-year-old six-year-old and two-year-old eight and six-year-old are at Champlain Elementary School down Pine Street and our two-year-old is in preschool here and we have a lot of really important issues ahead of us. Joe touched on some of them and climate change is certainly among the top priorities that we have been addressing on the City Council and that we need to continue addressing on the City Council and no small part because of my becoming a father and having three small kids. I look towards the future and I'm worried about the climate future for our three kids. I'm looking forward to discussing the issues today but in my first term of the City Council as chair of our ordinance committee we've taken some really important steps on climate like eliminating minimum parking requirements and allowing more density and becoming a more walkable bikeable city, establishing new housing districts like the south end innovation district and the south end, working hard on items like the neighborhood code which will upsell in the whole city and hopefully envision a more car-free Burlington future. Before I joined the City Council I was chair of the Parks Commission and there we started working with our conservation committee on more nature-based climate solutions increasing the size of the tree canopy here using our parks and open spaces to use nature-based solutions that I'm looking forward to continuing to work with our committees and boards on that matter and we have I think now here in Burlington really one of the most progressive climate policies of any small city in the country with our new carbon pollution impact fee and the efforts we've taken to prioritize electric electrification of our buildings. I'm looking forward to discussing these and other issues today. Thank you. Thank you all. My name is Sarah Carpenter and I live in Ward 4 which is in the new north end of Burlington on the west side of North Avenue but I actually grew up in town and so I'm very familiar with this neighborhood and my interest in being the City Council would be my third term. It's to really serve the city that I grew up in. I love this city and we've got a lot a lot of work to do. I want it to be a safe city and a city that does as much as it can to to mitigate what's coming around with a statewide organization the largest housing organization in the state an efficiency energy efficiency a lot of innovative programs in the affordable housing sector and we need to do a lot more. The building sector is about 30% 36% of our pollution around the city and that needs to be a high target area. I personally since I've been on the Council have worked on enacting rental weatherization standards. I was very active in the charter change that allowed the renewable carbon impact fee and spent time at the legislature advocating for that. We enacted a heating ordinance that requires the use of electric and renewable energy which was a big step forward. We've electrified our fleet we have dozens of consumer incentives which we really need to expand. There's a lot to work on and I think that will be a priority and is a priority myself. Hi everyone my name is Will Anderson I'm I live right down on South Union Street here which is part of Ward 6. Ward Champlain used to be part of Ward 6 it's no longer now the ward is the Hill section including the UVM Redstone campus and honestly Burlington's leadership and climate policy for a small city is a big reason why I moved here several years ago because like a lot of us I wanted to live my life in a way that was as favorable as possible to the environment which is a really difficult thing to do in the United States but Burlington is one of the best places to do it and I think that we should continue on that path. Namely although we have this 100% renewable energy commitment and it's been a great you know shining light for small and mid-sized cities around the country and many more followed in our footsteps we have the McNeil plant which while it's renewable has carbon emissions that are you know equivalent or even might even be worse than that of a coal burning plant. So as a city councilor my priority would be to start setting up the alternatives we need to shut down that plant which would be renewable energy sources that don't impact the atmosphere and impact the climate in the same way that a word word would burning plant does. My philosophy of how we should do that is mainly solar first especially community-owned solar in an energy democracy model is the you know the concept that I like to think of and also you know it's not just the renewable energy that we can use to encourage you know a better climate friendly living we can expand our public transit options so that people don't have to have a car to get around we're already pretty close but there's still a lot of work to do. We can also expand our urban agriculture output to make our food system more local and our city even more of a carbon sink. A lot of these ideas go hand-in-hand and I'll be bringing them a lot of them to the table should it be elected to the city council on town meeting day. Thanks again. We're right at the level the mic let me see if I can do that. Hey everyone my name is Laina Greenberg I use they them pronouns I live down on Maple Street running in Ward 5 so if you live in the building above Magic Chopsticks and Shy Guy that's my ward tell your friends thank you. I'm running for city council because I see the gross underperformance of our city and our current council on climate policy. We've passed a bunch of stuff that's great unless we're enacting it and unless we're counting all of our emissions it's not real climate policy. We have folks on our council who unfortunately seem to think it's fine to prioritize the comfort of those who are already comfortable now at the expense of those of us who have to live through the rest of this crisis that's unacceptable. I don't want to sit back and let my representative say oh it's simply too hard you know to ask the biggest polluters in our town to take responsibility for their emissions. I've been campaigning on climate for 10 years I grew up in New York City and was involved in a bunch of disruptive action around the Youth Climate Summit in 2019. I and a cohort of other young folks busted into a wine and dine affair of the largest oil and gas CEOs in the world and delivered them an award that said they knew about the climate crisis and they lied. So I hope to bring some of that energy and ambition to city council now is a time for us to do things not just pass the buck onto generations like ours. I want to live here for a long time that means we need a planet to live on. I hope to have your support on March 5th. Hi my name is Merrick Broderick. I'm running for city council in Ward 8. I live down on Maple Street and I'm running because I want to see Burlington thrive but we can't have it thrive unless it meets the needs of every resident in the city. As an organizer on the ground I've been experiencing first hand the many crises that affect our communities. Chief most of those is the climate crisis and my priorities on working towards housing also residents of Burlington and creating a city that is more livable and traversable for all in a safe and efficient manner without the need for cars. It all comes together in the fight against climate change. I believe that we need a city council for representatives will take aggressive decisive action to address these needs of decarbonizing our city and becoming a beacon for the country and the world for a city in the post greenhouse gas future. I want to be a part of that by working towards dismantling our polluting infrastructure actually counting the emissions that that Burlington is involved in with the airport and are taking of resources outside of our state for pollution. And if elected. I will be spearheading the progressive movement to make our city more livable for everyone. Thank you. Hello my name is Lee Morgan. My pronouns are they them. I am the progressive nominee for Ward 7 out in the new North End across the street from a counselor carpenter on North Ave. So yes. So why am I running so I'm running because my neighbors have been asking me to run for about 3 years. And when they first started asking me I felt like I wasn't quite ready yet. And if I was going to do this thing I wanted to do it right for my neighbors. So what did I do. I went back to school and I worked on finishing my bachelor's degree in political science. I'll be done in about 5 months. So and I got to tell you as as my colleague here can relate to running a campaign and being a full time student not for the faint of heart. But you know I don't want to discourage anyone from attempting it in the future. So one thing I also wanted to do is as I'm sure a lot of you probably heard Burlington's in in real financial trouble coming up with this deficit we're going to be facing in the budget. So I really wanted to come with that financial experience. So how I did that is I worked on getting a commission on a commission and I am on the Parks Rec and Waterfront Commission currently serving in my second term appointed by some of these lovely folks at the table. And on that commission I have developed experience helping to manage millions of dollars in public funds. So I feel like now at this point I am ready to step up for my neighbors. I'm also ready to make history. So if I win this election it will be historic in a few different ways. I will be the first progressive to have ever won in Ward 7. I will also be the first openly queer and trans counselor to ever represent Ward 7. And as if there's any anyone in this room that's queer and trans you will also relate to the fact that the better we do the more reactionary forces rise up to fight against us. And I've been experiencing that in this race but I'm so encouraged that my neighbors have had my back and now I'm ready to have the backs of my neighbors. Thanks. Hey everybody. Thanks for having us. My name is Carter Newpeas and I'm running for City Council in Ward 1. I've been involved in local issues coming up on a decade now. I helped write universal or resolution that would universally weatherize rental units that Councillor Carpenter alluded to earlier helped write the charter change to allow the city a few years ago to actually regulate thermal systems in our buildings because we didn't have that authority. And this like Joe said a bit of a full circle moment because myself and former Councillor Hanson and Sarah's Cortino were co founders of run on climate because we saw the the need to move at the municipal level in areas all across this country on climate. Currently in my day job at work for 350 Vermont were environmental justice non profit focused on mostly at the statewide level but in localities across the state focused on transitioning us off of fossil fuels off of high carbon fuels but in a way that doesn't leave frontline communities behind in a way that doesn't leave working class people behind. The main reason I'm running I mean I dedicated my entire personal and professional life to climate and democracy reform but I'm also running because it is incredibly expensive to live here in our city leadership continues to make decisions that prioritize the financial needs of those at the very top. So what do I mean by this for example if you're renting or you know you see your utilities come in whether that's through your rent or directly all of our water rates just went up in the last few years. Not only did their water rates not go up or at the same time that this is happening the Burlington Country Club got a 200 to $230,000 some odd break on their water bill. No coverage in local media except for one online blog didn't hear city leadership give us a reasoning for that. At the same time that we're cutting city services by nearly right around 750,000 in 2024. We gave a huge tax break to businesses by raising the business personal property tax exemption from 45,000 75,000 at the same time that we're raising taxes across the board. We miss a plea on residents. So there's decisions like that that I think don't make any ethical sense. They don't make good financial management sense. And they don't make good economic sense. Thank you so much for such a wonderful opening statements. Now I think we have some prepared questions somewhat of a rapid fire around. It'd be great if you could answer with yes and no. If you want to say something, you know, please try to keep it so much short. So here we go. Do you do you think Burlington is is currently doing enough to combat climate crisis? And just yes or no that that's all we're looking for on paper. We have a lot of good goals and we've locked ourselves in because of decisions to meeting almost none of those goals. No. No. Definitely not. No. Do we have more to do? Yes. And I will advise that if you're on City Council, any of you, there's never a yes or a no. It takes a community decision to make things happen. As I mentioned before, I think Burlington has one of the most progressive climate policies of any small city in the country. So I think we've done a lot of good work. There's still a lot more to do, though. No. No. Do you support zoning changes that would allow more dense housing in neighborhoods across the city? I'm with Sarah. It's not a yes or no, but support neighborhood code increasing density at the same time. If you look at the places that we've up zoned, they're not the wealthy parts like we're in right now. I think most of Fort Six is untouched. A lot of places that have a lot of wealth are untouched and stay low density. Well, everywhere else seems to be shouldering that burden. I think that's the wrong way to go. I have to give a little bit more of a longer answer on this one. So I'm formerly unhoused. I'm also 15 years in recovery. My people are dying and a big part of the reason is there's there's no housing and sheltering options. So yes, my people need increased density in the zoning changes to make that possible. I agree. I think it is paramount of our city council to allow the building of more housing across the city and it needs to be done in an equitable way in a way that prioritizes mixed income, mixed use areas that make the city easier to navigate. Yeah, I agree with folks who have spoken already. Your lawn cannot come at the cost of our affordable housing. Yes. Yes, I have spent 25 years of my life encouraging density and I disagree with Carter. We have up zoned the entire city in the proposals. Yes, and I agree. If we can get the neighborhood code across the line, it will up zone the entire city in a really meaningful way. Yes. Yes, it's a classist to increase the zoning proportionally as is being being done phase one of the neighborhood code. I would support the elimination of low density residential. You know, I think we should have at least medium density as a floor for the city. I support density. Density is better for the environment. It will make it easier for our city to grow for people to get off cars and ultimately for us to be able to bring regional transit, better regional transit to Boston and also Montreal. Do you support fair free public transportation in the city of Burlington? Yes, and I worked with Councillor Hanson to get that through the legislature along with another group of climate folks. Yes, and this is a main part in my platform. Yes, I do support fair free public transit, but it is just a fact that we need to greatly expand the funding opportunities for Green Mountain Transit and we need to lean on our state and the federal government to help support that. Yes, we do need more funding for public transit and it needs to be free for everyone forever and also better connected with walking and biking infrastructure. The bus is not going to go everywhere you go, but you should be able to get there no matter where you come from. Short answer, yes. I do believe that. However, in the short term, I would be open to needs based options that, you know, reflect folks ability to pay. And I've promoted these ideas on the finance committee for Green Mountain Transit. Excuse me. I would love to see fair free transit, but we have so many needs. If I have an extra million dollars, not one of my questions has asked me how I'm going to transport a disabled person, an elderly person, a young mom with toddlers. And I think that's got to be a priority in our transit system. I agree with Will. I would appreciate our looking into a more needs based approach. The fact of the matter is that there are some folks who use public transit who can't afford it. And if we can use that money to expand the availability of public transit here in Burlington, I would support that. Yes, and I'll also echo Will's remarks. I agree that, yeah, it maybe shouldn't be the top priority to keep fair free. There are other serious issues such as service frequency. People aren't going to, you know, take buses if they're running every half hour or every hour. More frequent service that's more reliable is something that people will start to plan their lives around. Will was talking about a McNeil plant earlier. Do you believe the McNeil plant should be shut down within the next 20 years? No, all good, all good. Yes, as quickly as possible we need to phase out the McNeil plant. In my day job I work for 350 Vermont and we have worked tirelessly to do just that until hopefully we were working against the expansion that recently went through. Yes, absolutely. We absolutely as a city need to be moving away from biomass and having a long-term plan to transition away from McNeil using biomass is a key part of that. Yes, it is essential that we seek to dismantle the McNeil plant as soon as possible. However, that involves creating a comprehensive plan to ensure that we are replacing our polluting infrastructure with clean energy. The most important thing in our transition off of fossil fuels is making sure that it is just and that we're not asking working people to bear the burden. McNeil has kept electricity rates low and stable for a long time. We also need to transition off of burning trees for fuel which pumps out particulate matter that causes cancer and respiratory ailments in one of the most diverse neighborhoods in Burlington. We need alternatives. We need to phase out McNeil and in doing so make sure that we're not placing the burden on folks who can't afford to pay. Yes and I think that 20 years too long. Yes, I think unfortunately we're going to need all of the 20 years. Pulling McNeil now would raise our rates probably 30 percent and that is not just and I encourage people to understand what's going on at the McNeil place. We have not expanded it and we're proposing actually to reduce it over time so I encourage us to follow through that and make sure as one of the speakers said that we have a replacement fuel which we do not have at the time. I agree with everything Sarah said. Couldn't say it better myself. Thank you. Yes. I would like to phase out McNeil. I'm also aware that that's not something that's going to be feasible in the next decade or even two decades in all likelihood. We can try to incentivize our way to people having heat pumps. We can subsidize you know home batteries through green amount of power. There are all sorts of steps we can take to reduce demand for dirty energy to transition away but it's going to take a significant amount of time unless we start thinking more boldly than we currently are. So for instance perhaps partnering with Vermont Gas and piloting a program for network geothermal that sort of thing because right now I'm not seeing a way that in the near term we're going to be able to turn towards something cleaner. So it's certainly a goal of mind and it's something that I would work on in order to find a solution to be able to do so in the next decade or two. Thank you. Do you believe the city should work to reduce a mission from the airport? Yeah and I don't know actually if our mic may not be on but she got a text from somebody watching. But yes and I believe that our airport emissions are not included in our net zero plans we're not actually counting those emissions as a city. So I think a way we can reduce our emissions at the airport is a resolution that the council passed I believe unanimously that I support wholeheartedly is encouraging the Air National Guard to look at using flight simulation technology instead of the amount of training flights that they do. As most people know that the city council does not have control over what the mission is but I think we can continue building that good relationship and so we can you know get them to consider that big fan of that resolution. Yes I echo what Carter and Lee have said. Yeah and this is a huge equity issue the fact that Burlington is making decisions about the airport which is surrounded by South Burlington those F-35 Slyover Winooski these are incredibly diverse communities that are subject to the choices the Burlington City Council makes. We can't reduce emissions if we're not counting them we're not counting those emissions in the first place and we also are not taking responsibility for the negative impacts both to the environment and all the people who live underneath all of those plans. I don't have a solid yes or no on this one I definitely would like to pursue lobbying for a mission change from the Air National Guard especially getting them to stop those flights. I would also endeavor to incentivize greater public transit options to and from Burlington including rail including bus service and especially as Joe mentioned before Boston Montreal in theory which would reduce demand for flights but it's something I need to explore more and I don't have you know such a great alternative I would ever also mentioned that we should keep promoting beta incentivizing them to work here I mean beta's technology while not fully proven it's it's electric flight and I think it has a lot of potential. Thanks I agree with much of what folks have said I have no problem with counting emissions and we but we need to push the FAA and the US Air Force on this Burlington much to people should grin does not really have that control we cannot limit flights we cannot ask airplanes to use certain kinds of fuels there is much we cannot do but we need to pressure them I think the resolution that Lee talked about is a step forward and we really need to work hard on that. Yes I think we should do more to reduce emissions from the airport just in addition to what other folks have said here I think that there's a lot we can do with the physical facilities out of the airport themselves to improve their thermal energy systems to use the space that we have out there to stand up new renewable fuel sources and so I think that's an area that we can continue to do more in. Yes. Yes and lastly do you support VT Act 250 and the HOME Act? Admittedly I'm not familiar with it so I would want to read first. I'm sorry did you say Act 250? Act 250. Yes so you know like Carter I'm not an expert on this I have heard what I feel are some valid criticisms that the initial reasons for Act 250 and why it may have been important then are really just hindering progress now I am all for having systems examined and audited so I would fully support the council looking at Act 250 and working with our legislature to encourage any changes that we felt would help increase density. I agree with Lee I think Act 250 as currently constructed has worked over the decades to hinder Burlington's ability to increase density and yeah I echo what Lisa says. For folks who aren't familiar Act 250 is a statewide policy that is why we don't have billboards and also why Vermont is pretty land use policy is really important when it prevents us from being able to build the housing we need it's a problem I believe and the legislature is working on a compromise that would revise Act 250 and move us to a more balanced approach where we can both protect the the forests that have not been built on and also make sure that we can build more density unfortunately our republican governor is not into that compromise so making moves on that is huge we need policy that that holds both because we need both to preserve our our forests and make space for folks to live. In general I support both laws in principle along the lines that Lena described however I strongly support the compromise that they mentioned which I believe is h147 in the legislature right now but please don't quote me on that which would essentially endeavor to have Act 250 enforcing in rural areas protecting our natural landscape while allowing density in cities to increase more rapidly. We don't have very many cities here in Vermont we're you know city of 42,000 the largest city in the state we need to be able to get more dense more quickly and have supply start to meet demand. Thanks I think part of your question was do we support the home act? Yes. And the home act is the current legislation reviewing all of these things and it's 95 pages so I don't expect anyone to understand it although I have to say I have spent time on it I personally as a counselor spent some time in the legislature and I think that is an appropriate role for counselor to look at what a city needs versus other parts of the state I spent my entire professional career in affordable housing and butted against a lot of arcane things so I'm I'm am supportive of it and I think it's important for the city council to be right on top of it. I'm also supportive of it and to the extent current Act 250 regulations are standing as an unreasonable hurdle to more dense urban development here in Burlington there needs to be a change. Yes. Yes. Thank you. Now I would like to open it up to the audience for any questions they might have. Hi all thank you for coming is this working? Yeah okay I did have a question about I actually live in Ward 1 and I did have a question about the the upzoning because there recently there was an article in VT Digger how it was VT Digger or seven days anyway about how some of the proposed the current proposed changes would actually increase climate change you know thinking about lawns I get that but we also do we do need some green space in carbon sinks so I was wondering if anyone had any further kind of more nuanced thoughts about that. I can go so I actually talked to you it's been VT Digger was an op-ed. So yeah I actually called Paul right after he wrote that and he had sent me in advance because I'm on the Ward 1 MPA and I just finished knocking doors for the campaign and a bunch of folks had brought up neighborhood code so I came up with a list of essentially every concerning question that I had heard and emailed that to Megan Tuttle who had come to present at our last MPA this Wednesday saying hey I support upzoning and hear all the concerns and sort of the implementation questions that need to be addressed and that folks are bringing up one of those being Paul's article which he sent me in a Google form before he submitted it. So I don't know the answer I mean we had a long conversation about an hour and a half I think it's a nuanced one but one of the things we came to after speaking on the phone was you know as far as I understand it we didn't take for example into account built infrastructure and the impacts on our sewer roads bridges costs associated that with that over time how does the increased tax base you know you could argue well the increased tax base is going to come out we're going to come out ahead financially but we don't actually have those numbers as far as I can tell and the incumbent counselors can correct me but so essentially I want to I want to make decisions thinking about them holistically and we haven't done that from a carbon sink perspective or from like a green space perspective and the impact there so yeah I think Paul's argument was essentially like let's the best we can keep the footprints the same but build up rather than sort of build maybe what like like these giant condo complexes like you see in South Burlington or something yeah I hope that's that's helpful but it's it's definitely a certain yet I think it's a we need the city to pause particularly for ward one which is going to be greatly impacted by this decision and actually answer these concerns more robustly and think through this I think from a couple angles before we move forward yeah so this is a mixture I'm not too loud I typically don't even need a microphone so I think this is a great question I think with a lot of things in life you have to look at it on a case-by-case basis so you know in ward seven a very different situation than you would be dealing with in ward one or ward you know even like ward three so I'm knocking doors right now and there's a lot of open space and I really reflect on you know the amount of housing we could put in in ward seven and I also have some experience with this on the parks commission so something that we do occasionally is we will look at uh lots for sale and you know if we should be recommending some of these lots that the city acquire and conserve and what is top of mind for me is always a blend of what is best for the environment what is best for our citizens and I believe we can make decisions that achieve both of those I think that's why uh the I'm endorsed by the sunrise movement because of that commitment and and yeah so I think we can look at these things uh case-by-case and even site by site I agree that when thinking about our vision for making a denser Burlington we do need to make sure we're looking at all of the positives and negatives we take out of it I do believe that it's important that we take time to look these over but it does not detract from the fact that we need to be aggressive and decisive when making these decisions I agree that Carter that building taller is very important just as just as much if not more than purely just expanding density and to carbon sinks I think that thinking about lawns monoculture grass is not a very productive carbon sink I think we could definitely look at creating more diversified projects if we want to create urban carbon sinks the idea of something increasing climate change is it's not one thing right and we have housing shortage and we need to build more housing the population of Jinden County has been increasing steadily for the last you know decades Burlington's population has stayed sturdy because we're not building any housing so we've now added all of these units that people are driving to and from so that raises the question of okay how are we looking at emissions are we just looking at the building itself or are we looking at all of the associated costs of having people anywhere in space if we are building more densely it's easier to walk and bike and take the bus to where you need to go transportation is a huge component of our emissions as our building so maybe more directly to your point we could do a better job of forcing and and you know incentivizing the those large building owners to decarbonize their buildings and making sure that new builds are well insulated and using electricity instead of gas and that's something in the city council's jurisdiction that I have not seen the the needed ambition that that we you know we could bring to say this shouldn't be your job to front the cost of a $2,000 heat pump let's address climate change in a way that's going to be effective and quick that means we get at the biggest emitters first in terms of green space zoning is not just one tool it's it's a big set of tools that mean a lot of things for the shape and size of buildings that we end up with we can have green roofs and green spaces and bioswales and rain gardens and you know diversified pollinator gardens in between those buildings I grew up in New York City and you could put green space just about anywhere you can fit it it's a beautiful thing and I'm sure that we can do that in Burlington thanks for the question this has been something that's been on my mind for sure but I think the evidence shows that density relieves pressure on the climate particularly with suburbanization right if you think about the suburban communities that have sprawled out from Burlington and from practically every city in the country those are a lot worse for the environment because you have to have a car to get everywhere you know the energy has to has to flow to a greater extent so when we create more density here we can relieve pressure on you know rural areas and suburban areas for the climate you know and new development as Lena mentioned can have new standards for for insulation like the Passive House standard which is you know almost like net neutral but I also don't think that green space is exclusive to you know non-dense urban areas not only have we demonstrated that here with the is good urban gardening program but I think the city of Montreal isn't even perhaps even better example with the pocket parks and with the rural's verus program so you know I don't think that a I think that we need the density absolutely and b as long as we're you know observing critically where climate impacts could be we can create solutions to those problems I do think that the water and sewer question is a very concerning one that's something admittedly that I haven't been educated on and something I've been learning more about but again I think as long as we're conscious about it and making sure that our public works have the capacity to handle a given development we shouldn't use this as a reason to prevent increasing density I think it's an absolutely desperate need for our city at this point in time thanks I am fully supportive of the neighborhood code and and in that article that was in the newspaper there's a lot of discussion of building up and out on and and the author wrote about many sites every single one of the sites that he is referenced is under active consideration it will produce thousands of units and we have to very carefully make sure we have the infrastructure the neighborhood code really is a step back from that that's an ability to in our neighborhoods do some modest expansion there are many homes that where people are over housed and there's a presumption that the neighborhood code is going to build all new there are lots of buildings I mean the home I live in now in the 60s had eight people in it we've only got three there is room to put a unit in my basement a unit in my garage without building new there's lots of homes that could expand and it's important to understand that this initiative got full support from groups like AARP where they have members who are saying I'm sitting in a big old home what could I do to expand it add a unit add a two so I think we have to follow the infrastructure needs but we can't lose that one tool to expand it in the neighborhoods so the neighborhood in ward one the Brooks Loomis North Street that area right now it's in a zoning district that's allowed to build out to 35% lot coverage and that includes all impervious surface so it's your building it's your driveway it's your stone patio and so on that 35% figure was put into place in the 1970s but most of the houses in the neighborhood were built well before then and are actually non-conforming to that standard so right now in that neighborhood 68% of the properties have lot coverage that's in excess of 45% and so you have a lot of these older aging inefficient buildings where folks are not permitted to make changes including to the end of more efficiency because it's currently non-conforming so as Sarah mentioned that the neighborhood code first and foremost is to really sort of legalize these buildings as they exist right now not really to increase the footprint of them all that much but to bring currently non-conforming buildings into compliance with the law such that changes to older inefficient buildings can be made just two other points real quick one is that if the neighborhood code were to pass I do believe it would be a more gradual process it's not like suddenly tomorrow to the extent anyone can increase their footprint that it's going to happen and then even beyond that there would still be for many of these projects a development review board process here in Burlington which would focus specifically on stormwater and other issues along those lines in terms of the development application however where we are working on more comprehensive redevelopment I mean we've just resumed part of the south end as the south end innovation district right now we're working on a south end redevelopment agreement with Champlain Housing Trust and other private developers down there where we really are trying to build a neighborhood all at the same time from the ground up there we are taking a very close look at at stormwater and other climate and environmental issues how can some of these nature-based climate solutions play into that and so no doubt if there was a larger project as a part of the neighborhood code we would similarly take a look at those issues at that time yeah I definitely support the neighborhood code I think we're in a situation right now and I think this happens a lot on council issues where there were opportunities for residents to engage but they probably were not advertised in the best way possible which is just so classic and so I know I attended a as Sarah mentioned AARP has been a big supporter and so I attended one of the community conversations that they partnered with the city to put on and I felt like that was a really good avenue for neighbors to be able to sit down and discuss this but obviously I think there's a lot of Ward 1 folks that were largely feeling left out of that conversation because they didn't know the meetings were happening and so overall definitely supportive but do you think that it is problematic to push forward a policy if a large number of neighbors in one section of the city are seeing it as problematic so I'll be interested to see what conversations come out of there so this zoning conversation is very important but as has been pointed out by others it's not going to make a big difference overnight in terms of our built environment and one other area that informs our built environment that hasn't been discussed today is tax policy so right now we don't have vacancy tax we have a vacancy ordinance with some fees but it's it's pretty minor there's a lot of redevelopment that can and should happen in our downtown we also tax land and structure is the same which means your tax bill goes up if you make an extension on your house if you put in an accessory dwelling unit in some states in some cities around the country land is taxed more than structures which reduces the disincentive on development so I think we need to take a thorough look at our tax system in addition to this zoning process that's currently underway in order to stop what Lena mentioned this sprawl that we cause to the neighboring cities that have been growing or towns that have been growing significantly in the last 50 years I encourage more individuals to ask questions hello my name is Emma it's nice to meet you all thank you for coming my question sort of goes off of something Ben said but it is for everyone so could you speak more on the development of the innovation district and how we'll developing this area address environmental concerns both regarding environmental justice issues and like accessibility and how the construction would affect important ecosystems in that area near the lake Ben and as this district spent a long time on it so I'll let him take the lead but I really think it's important for people to understand that when we have big major redevelopments they often really improve the infrastructure and ecosystems around we buy things like Act 250 city ordinance require a lot more of those developments so there's a perception that somehow the built environment will degrade a neighborhood but in fact in many areas and improves them we require like those near the lake to have a lot more stormwater runoff and they're actually even though they're densely building the improvement to many of the neighborhoods yeah thanks very much for that question I'm really excited about the work that's happening in the south end innovation district but it does need to be the right balance with the surrounding environment the city council should soon be receiving an update on what they've been putting together in terms of the development agreement so I would encourage you and others who've been following this to tune in but right now most of what they're considering developing is a surface parking lot and there's almost nothing worse for our lake health and the surrounding environment than rain and stormwater just falling on and pooling on and running off of a surface parking lot what they're working on right now tears that up puts in much more efficient built environment that takes stormwater into play into consideration we're considering what's the other sort of demand going to be on other city utilities and making sure that that fits into the picture there's a lot in the plan that makes this neighborhood a walkable and bikeable community for everyone to live work and play there so I'm very excited about what's to come and again there should be more plans that they've been working on coming forward soon the other thing that I'll say is one of the things that we did put in here is that in terms of the affordable housing requirement in this community it has to be built in the south end innovation district so the housing developers there they can't meet their affordability requirement by placing affordable housing elsewhere it's going to have to be met by building affordable housing there in the south end innovation district I'll speak to that as well that's my word too the thing that comes to mind when you ask about ecosystems is how water moves obviously the lake is a huge asset for us not just because we drink that water but because it brings the tourists and it makes Burlington beautiful and it's such an essential part of our Champlain Valley ecosystem we need to build so much stormwater infrastructure to offset any building project then there's the question of what happens outside of that neighborhood that's rolling downhill word five is kind of shaped like this and I'd love to see that district not just say let's accommodate the stormwater that we're displacing by building new buildings let's build pervious surfaces we need rain gardens we need you know no lawns under two inches when you go over two inches then you're suddenly retaining so much more water diversified again pollinator friendly ecosystems really help keep water out of the lake and filter that water before it goes into the sewer system we have all of that water running downhill so what about strategically placing rain gardens so that we don't have you know those corridors that's dirty water oh did we just no that was just me those kind of runoff streams that come down from neighborhoods that are older don't have as much stormwater infrastructure thinking about how that water moves thinking about green roofs and ways to not just make space for offsetting the impact of development but use that as green space for people and for recreation is really important just a quick comment or two I think this project is is one of the first since we reformed our minimum parking requirements and so that's an element here that you know kind of a new element to be litigated in the public discourse and I think it's very important because you know if we don't have very much parking there that will be as good for our bus system as good for public expanding public transit as making fares free as increasing service some folks have come and spoken about the Winooski bridge redesign project and and and emphasize to the council this concept of induced demand that if we widen the lanes there allow for faster car travel don't have protected bike infrastructure that we're gonna incentivize people to drive more by making it even more efficient and faster for people to be able to drive in and out of the city so I think it's you know important in the Winooski bridge project that we have protected bike infrastructure that we not make it easier or faster for cars to get through and and in relation to the Southland Innovation District that we not add you know any unnecessary parking and that we take the minimum parking reform responsibility very seriously on council well just very quickly two things one I just want to echo what Joe just said around the Winooski bridge because all the research when you think about built infrastructure and safe street design supports what Joe is saying that people follow the design the design doesn't actually reduce demand you can think about like ever expanding highways in that sense the other piece I don't have enough information to have a strong opinion on the innovation center so I just need to do more research and think about it more and talk to constituents but just generally zooming out whenever we're talking about increasing density one of the problems that we have to take into account and this is part of the question list I sent to Megan for the MPA is the UVM problem so to speak the amount of students that are pouring into our neighborhoods and taking up available rental housing we have one of the lowest vacancy rates as far as I can tell in the country we certainly I think it's between half a percent and a percent whereas the national average is over five percent and the current MOU being negotiated if what they presented last council I know there were some updates stands and isn't significantly changed is not going to address that in the long term we're going to be in the same position in about half a decade only the gross number of folks in the city is going to be a lot higher I was a student I came here for UVM I also rented off campus my junior year so it's not a an issue with students but obviously there are colleges including Champaign I believe that house students all four years folks can correct me if I'm wrong and we ought to be asking and pressuring UVM to do the same yeah you know some whereas Lena was talking I was kind of reflecting that you know I think a big part of what we really need here is we need to elect counselors that have the political courage to act we really need counselors making bold action especially when it comes to the climate so as you're considering who you will vote for and also who you will support whose campaign you want to volunteer for I would encourage you to really evaluate who has the political courage to act I'd like to echo what Joe said about talking about things like the Manuski bridge and induced demand I think that's a very overlooked aspect of climate justice where we have to completely move past just telling people what needs to be done and hoping that they do it we need to change the systems around people in order to incentivize doing one thing and de-incentivize doing another thing and I think that's most importantly shown with de-incentivizing using a car and incentivizing living in Burlington living where you work living where you go to school and creating infrastructure around you so you can do that easily yeah I mean to Lee's point I think the SEID was bold action there were so many counselors and city staff that worked tirelessly to ensure that this project was done and will be done in the best way possible taking into account climate issues making sure that the housing would be affordable and so I would encourage you to look at the counselors that really led on that including counselor Traverse just because they were the ones that actually did the work here so thank you so much before we move ahead I just want to say Champlain College and UVM does not endorse any of the candidates here okay I completely forgot about that I have to make sure I say that okay well I would like to thank City Council candidates for participating in this event and answering some of the questions I would also like to thank Ronan Climate Champlain College EcoReps and Climate Action Collective similar to the opening statements you have about 90 seconds to give us a quick closing statement and Holly will let you know when it's about time okay so again my name is Joe Kane I'm running in Ward 3 I take this issue very seriously climate that is even in my lifestyle I don't fly I've never owned a car as an adult I will bike everywhere no matter how inconvenient or dangerous it is which feels really stupid sometimes but I'm very committed in my lifestyle I've been vegan my entire adult life because of the environmental impact of eating at higher trophic levels it's less efficient to eat to eat meat for instance you know if you eat chicken right the chicken is going to eat way more in the way of calories we spend a lot of fresh water and calories and land arable land on domesticated livestock this is yeah a very core issue to who I am as a person I would you know carry that with me every day on council thinking about these urgent issues transitioning you know our grid getting people you know to to use less in the way of fossil fuels less in the way of energy you know I would I would be supportive of a kitchen sink approach to climate because I think that you know we don't have a solar bullet we we need to work through individual incentives you know we need to work with green mountain power we need to work with from on gas systems pilot new infrastructure projects you know we need to work on our own infrastructure and and have a bold vision as I touched on with the Manuski bridge project there's a lot of work to be done and I'm ready to do it uh thank you again to Champlain the eco reps student climate collective and run on climate for not only putting together today's forum but really doing the work in a lot of these climate-based votes that we're taking to do advocacy and outreach to counselors it's very helpful my name is Hannah King and I'm asking for your support on March 5th you can learn more about our campaign at hannahforberlington.com thank you thanks Hannah thanks very much to Champlain College to our moderator and to the other partner organizations and putting this on it's always nice to connect with the candidates and talk about the issues like this especially an important issue like climate change I started working on the climate my first job out of college is I went to go work for the senate campaign for Sheldon White House in Rhode Island and then went to go work with him in Washington DC for a number of years and he's really one of the first United States senators that's been calling the alarm on a pretty regular basis with respect to climate change and what's and what's happening the frustrating part is that at the national level and pretty much in every other community around the country you know a policy like carbon pricing for example that senator Whitehouse has been calling for for decades isn't even off the ground in most of the country beautiful part about Burlington is here it's not even it's not a question of whether or not we should have a fee right I mean here what we're debating is how much should the fee be and you know that that is one of the great parts about being here in Burlington is that we are taking bold steps in standing up something like a carbon pollution impact fee in demanding that folks use electrified systems and only rely on fossil fuels if electrification is infeasible that we are prioritizing walking bike infrastructure in our projects that we're standing up denser neighborhoods to become a more car-free community I've been excited to be a part of these steps and would look forward to continuing them if reelected to the council thank you yes thank you all and I'll concur some with my colleagues I think we've done a lot but we have so much more to do and I think we've got a lot to be proud of we have an electric department who's given massive incentives one of the things we worked on was a 20 million dollar energy efficiency bond we're 25 times the uses of heat pumps in Burlington but we still have more to do about 36 percent of our pollution comes through home heating 34 percent through vehicle traffic that's manageable we can target that and we need to do that and we need to do it I think by incentives and working together with our utilities and making it feasible for all families not just moderate income but low-income families and I think there's much more work to be done on that and we need to partner with the state on that one of the things my former organization did just this year was allow for on-bill financing so that you could do those improvements in your home that doesn't seem like a very sexy thing but if it costs you know ten thousand dollars to improve your home you can't pay that out on one pop you need a way to stretch it out over time so there's a lot of things like the on-bill financing and more incentives that we need to work on look I I think that at this point I don't really trust in the rest of the country and the rest of the world to reduce their carbon emissions because of you know the crisis in the atmosphere and in the climate I mean that much is clear to me at this point so I think that if we want to continue to be a leader of communities in reducing emissions we should do so by setting an economic example and at the same time we do that we can make it more affordable for people to live here especially working people how do we do that for one McNeil is really really expensive to run I mean the credit system is one thing but if we invest in community solar and other community own sources of renewable energy that don't have these emissions that investment could really pay off for everyone in the long term if we make it easier to get around by public transit not just around the city through bike and pedestrian infrastructure and buses but to and from the city with rail with the bus with greater bus transportation we could reduce the need for flights these things have huge economic benefits again especially for working people so as a city counselor I would endeavor to look at it from that perspective we're already doing a lot of great work to reduce our emissions but we can go even farther and demonstrate that people can really save money and live better lives if we do these things appreciate your support if you're in Ward 6 please get in touch with me I do have a website I've got some materials I can look through and thanks again for having all of us here today thanks everyone who helped make this happen and thank you all for taking time out of your day I know you've got a lot of other stuff going on but we all know that climate cannot wait even if you have class in 20 minutes this is a now problem this summer I was part of a crew of people that basically put McNeil on the climate agenda for Burlington it was flying under the radar as the electric department's kind of greenwashing unicorn of zero emissions just because you don't count the emissions doesn't mean they are not there I want to see a council that's counting emissions we have had solutions to the climate crisis since long before most of us in this room were born it's not a question of how it's a question of if and that if is about political will please look at who's been voting on what and how they've been voting it matters there are only 12 people on the city council the more folks we have who are taking this crisis as seriously as it must be taken the better off we're going to be now and in the future I usually am over there now I'm over here because I saw that this was not working and I really encourage you to support young folks on the council and folks who are not afraid to make those make those scary choices and really push all of the systems that are holding us in place to transform we need to treat this crisis as an opportunity to have a better world and a society that is just and fair thank you so much for your attention and please keep showing up it really is so essential yeah so my name is Merrick Broderick I'm running in Ward 8 and I completely agree with Lena's perspective here I was also on the other side on the ground organizing for issues such as climate justice and that is why I'm running it's up here in government we're not doing enough we're doing something but we're not doing enough and we need leaders in the city who are going to go the extra mile in terms of being aggressive and bold with our climate action and I would love to be a part of that movement if I have your vote and I appreciate all the support I also have a website and if you want to talk to me I will be here well thanks folks for coming and thanks to our hosts my name is Lee Morrigan my pronouns are they them and I am the Progressive nominee for Ward 7 so I got my start in environmental justice by way of social justice I will always show up for folks that society pushes to the side myself included and yeah you know I think as people have mentioned the status quote the time for that is over I am very proud to be endorsed by the sunrise movement who are sounding the alarm that we are indeed in an emergency so like I mentioned before please look at your choices carefully and if the environmental crisis is something that is important to you please choose people with the political courage to go further than we have ever gone before because we need nothing less than that and I also want to point out volunteers have the power to change elections so if this election is important to you please find a candidate that you want to support one single shift of phone banking or knocking doors does matter so please reach out to the candidate of your choice if you want to connect with me I'll be here after this forum you can also reach me through leeforberlington.com thank you yeah thank you to our hosts and for everybody who participated in the debate today there's so many things to say for our closing statements I'll just say you know it's really hard to evaluate candidates I remember for every election cycle you look and you see these literature pieces at your door and they all basically say the same things in Burlington with nice bullet points I guess the thing I'll leave folks with with is you know in the same way that you have to follow the votes as Laina referred to you need to follow the money one of the first campaign ads Bernie ever ran when he first ran for mayor was this poster my friend has up in their living room that's Burlington's not for sale and there's a little Palmer Lou real estate sign on there well we still have a lot of decisions being made that are benefiting folks like Palmer Lou and Palmer Lou is still donating tens of thousands of dollars to influence local elections the VW dealership down the street here toward route seven is still donating tens of thousands of dollars redstone is still donating tens of thousands of dollars and we cannot take money from those at the very top and those who have economic and social and political power in the city and then stand up to them and try to regulate them and try to push the city forward for average residents so I'm proud not to be taking any corporate money I'm proud not to be taking money from folks like the Palmer Luz and if elected I will make sure that I'm representing all of your interests and not Ernie's thanks thank you so much before we wrap this up I would like every I would like to encourage everyone to register to vote if you're already registered you should have received the mail-in ballot in your mail and again thank you so much all the candidates and all the individuals here for coming to the city council climate forum and I would like to thank every person who came in this event to ask question and understands the candidate's policy stance thank you so much