 So for those of you who don't know me, which I think everyone does I'm Alec Ellsworth the parks director for the city of Montpelier I've been a parks director for About a year and ten months now took over for Jeff Beyer After his 39 and a half year tenure With the park. I'm sure all of you know him as well and all the good stuff you did for our city and This is really an extension of Work that you know Jeff was working on for a long time, which was to grow Hubbard Park and grow outdoor recreation And it's something that were Really excited to bring to the public It feels like we're in an exciting place with this project So I'll just give you some context here This is an overview map you can see Hubbard Park just think of a laser pointer Wow amazing Beautiful Oh, yeah So Hubbard Park and then you'll see the two parcels here the Haney parcel is in green and the Johnson parcel is in purple They're nestled right in there on the left-hand side And I'll go back to this map to explain what these other big shaded areas are because they are they're important There the Haney parcels about 50 acres and the Johnson parcel is about 28 acres So All in all we're getting close to an 80-acre addition to Hubbard Park, which is about 175-ish acres right now, so we're almost a 50% increase in the size of the park Here's a little close-up view you can see Clarendon Avenue here Deerfield Drive going up here Hubbard Park Drive right there. So the property is Accessed by Hubbard Park and There are a lot of folks who live along this is all houses and private property a lot of people access Through the back of their property and and as I understand from talking to people in the neighborhood. It's a Pretty open sieve here through these private parcels where people who might not live adjacent to the park Sounds like there's a lot of ways to get in there Yes, exactly and Jeff always used to say if you if you sort of put up a ribbon around Hubbard Park It would not be as big as people thought it was Around all our parks really and I think these two parcels are probably the number number one and two Maybe that people might assume are part of the park But I really not you can you can pretty easily find yourself on this land and many people have Accidentally and on purpose for many years to enjoy The beautiful the beautiful land that's up there So the first question now that we sort of understand where where we where the where the properties are is why bother with this project Why are we conserving these parcels? Why are we conserving any land in Montpelier at all? and There's really three things I want to touch on The first one is that this project is a small part of a much bigger vision for Montpelier and the vision is captured in this plan right here, which is called the Montpelier Parks Greenprint Plan and it was developed by the Parks Commission in the year 2008, so it's been around for some time and They they asked themselves, you know, what would Montpelier look like if we had a Seamlessly integrated network of trails and green spaces that were all connected to each other and connected to downtown and connected to the neighborhoods So people could move throughout town on these greenways in various modes of transport And get to and from where they lived and downtown Montpelier and this is sort of what they came up with so it encompasses a Lot of the you know, obviously it encompasses the parks Hubbard Park in the North Branch Park here But these areas that are drawn in green show areas that are, you know, part of the vision for this larger Open space in Montpelier that can be accessible to the public most of these lands right now are private lands And then if it's a little bit harder to see but the hatched green here In a number of places show ways that trails could connect to each other and to different neighborhoods So you'll see Right over here. These properties are nestled right into a part of this Green-print plan and it might seem like only a tiny chunk of You know only a tiny chunk of progress, but it really is a Huge addition because it opens up a lot of potential to move into this bigger Northern area Here and also and also the potential to Create a connection over to you know, some future Project over, you know on this side of town that could include trails in open space so The first point is that this this acquisition is part of a part of a bigger vision for Montpelier Oops the second one Is There are a lot there are a number of important natural features that are on these properties And I'll point your attention to this map over here So you'll see the Haney property here in the Johnson property here In blue are all the mapped wetlands that are on the Vermont significant wetlands inventory and then in red are the The only two state significant natural communities that are in the entire city of Montpelier and what that means is that in 2007 the conservation Commission Contracted with Brett Engstrom local naturalist are actually very well-known statewide naturalist to do a natural inventory of Natural resources inventory for Montpelier and so he went around and looked at a huge swath of the city and identified All the different natural communities as best he could and then identified the ones that were really significant. So we have 20 or so odd ones that were Significant from Montpelier either because they were very unusual or they were very important for biodiversity And then there were only two right here one and two that were significant on a state level because of the same reasons Not just unusual for Montpelier, but unusual for the state and significant for for biodiversity in the state of Vermont Which might be surprising Because here they are in sort of urban Montpelier But they are on the sort of on the border of this vast swath of forest that really goes all the way up from here, you know Virtually unbroken up to the Worcester Range into Hunger Mountain So these these two are on the southern tip of that What is the significance if you may I am not a naturalist, so I'm not equipped to answer that question they're hemlock hardwood swamps and Somebody who knows more about nature should answer that question So There's also More than 12 acres of wetland and and if any of you have ever walked this property, which I'm sure most of you have These blue areas do not even come close to capturing all the wetlands on this property this map was I'm guessing made with LiDAR some kind of satellite service and And this basically this whole central corridor here Which you can kind of intuit from where the wetlands are is very wet. So all of this in here is going to be What would almost certainly Again my very uneducated opinion be classified as a wetland if it were to be field surveyed And so what does that mean for Montpelier? Wetlands have a number of really important Functions for our city number one is this dream here drains north to the North Branch River and this dream here drains south to the Winooski River and all of the water that is Falling on this property or seeping out of the ground is all being captured and filtered by this You know this forest this natural forest land if you think about An infrastructure that it would take to catch an infrastructure project that could capture this much water Slow it down filter it For the city of Montpelier it would be on a on a scale of millions of dollars So these are the type of benefits that it's hard to capture, but they are they're very real for our very flood-prone city So they're number one these wetlands import perform important stormwater functions number two They're important for biodiversity in our city. So Anyone who enjoys seeing wildlife Experiencing wildlife while they're out in these natural areas all animals need to drink just like we do and Sometimes we don't realize that they can't turn on the faucet and drink when they want to they need wetlands. They need water Guarantee you every Wildlife every every animal that's out in this forest living out there knows where these wetlands are Because they perform a really key key function And that's really just scratching the surface of the ecological benefits of wetlands again. I'm that's really not up my alley but They are they are critical And then the last piece that I'll share is Economic development and so you might be thinking wait a minute conservation and economic development. What what is that? Those two seem like they're at odds with one another. Oh contraire there's a big push in Vermont and and indeed across the whole country to make the connection between outdoor recreation and economic development and There's a lot of great data now about What kind of economic development these these trail resources can bring to communities? So the really marquee one for Vermont is Kingdom Trails I don't know if any of you are mountain bikers. I'm not but Kingdom Trails I gather is like the regional destination for mountain biking in New England and they've had some economic impact studies done and They're bringing in over six million dollars a year in in new money to the businesses and communities That are part of Kingdom Trails. So that's You know East Burke Vermont Six million dollars can go a long way We did a little survey of Our mountain bike club to ask them, you know, where do you go mountain biking? Do you do you go in Montpelier? Do you go to Stowe? Do you go to Waterbury? How often do you leave Montpelier when you leave Montpelier? Do you shop? Do you get gas? You know, how do you spend your money at these other places and just with our little local group? The average was twenty five dollars every time they go to Katie Hill and Waterbury or Kingdom Trails or any of these local mountain bike spots Millstone over in Berry. They're spending on average twenty five dollars in food drink gas whatever You know commerce they might be engaging in so if you think about bringing a thousand people from outside Montpelier to Town to enjoy our trails whether they're hiking to the Tower of Mountain Biking in the North Branch Park $25,000 Spent in our local economy if we're bringing in 10,000 people a year, you know the number can get really big really quickly and That's just local people that might be people living in Berry East Montpelier Do you think about folks who are coming? They're not just Going out for a drink after a mountain bike they might be if they're coming from Massachusetts or New York or Canada They're going to be staying overnight spending more money in town and Really increasing the vibrancy of our community in our downtown and our whole pitch with outdoor recreation and economic development in Montpelier is that There are a lot of towns in Vermont that have great downtown's and there are a lot of towns that have great outdoor recreation There are not very many or maybe no towns that have seamlessly integrated trails in downtown and That is where we can really position ourselves As a destination for outdoor recreation So again, this is a small piece of that But we've we've identified three strategies for economic development and outdoor recreation Number one is telling the right story. So telling that story about a downtown seamlessly connected with outdoor recreation number two is Growing our large natural areas. So that's really where this fits in to offer more trails for More diverse experiences and longer experiences and then number three is to connect our trail systems to Downtown so that adventures can start and end downtown and also connect them to each other So that people can have longer adventures and then connect them to regional assets like rightsful reservoir across Vermont Trail An odd and odd East Montpelier so that you can sort of grow that choose your own adventure type of offerings that we have in town and Then there's it it's not listed here, but I'll just a slight Addendum that is kind of fits into part of a bigger vision from Montpelier, which is that Over here you'll see in purple These are all trails that are already on the Haney property We didn't we haven't I haven't mapped them for the Johnson property yet But it's it looks similar So people are using this for for hiking for biking for skiing And critical neighborhood access there's over 200 homes in this neighborhood You can imagine a situation where this property could go into different hands, you know The Haney family has been incredibly generous over the years with letting people use it but a Lot of people forget, you know, that's all it's all at their good will it could be closed off overnight and There's actually a good example of of how that that happened in a property adjacent to Hubbard Park on the other side Property changed hands posted sides went up made their own trail system and and own outdoor recreation and Were made it clear that other folks weren't welcome and you know people might have been walking on that property for decades and It can change quickly. So there's a there's a very local piece of this that's important as well when we when we started this process and a lot of you were We're a part of this, you know, we wanted to say to the community That lives there, you know to the neighborhood. Is this something you want? You know, we we don't want to put any staff or city time towards something that the neighbors don't want Do you want to see this become a park preserved forever so that people can access it? and the overwhelming answer was yes and You know People just told amazing stories about their experience on this property You know one one person who was on clarity and said that she she'd probably been on this property every day of the year for 30 years, you know barring being out of town can this Talk about intimate relationship, but I mean this is this is such a key part of her life Another person told me how when he first moved to town in the 1970s He used to go to this meadow down here That shaded in yellow and have a picnic and read his book every Sunday afternoon and what he met his wife That was a tradition that they had they would go every Sunday They picnic and and read a book in this meadow that he didn't own this property. I mean he didn't Nobody invited him there. He just found this sweet little corner of Montpelier that was special to him and his family So it has a lot of history And obviously people have great stories about Hubbard Park too So I want to cover this question, which is what about housing? Because this is a very important one The city has a lot of goals Right here. I just this is our most recent city council just finished their strategic planning process and they They identified these Six goals as their most important ones. There's a lot of initiatives under each one, but One entire goal is Create more housing It's important enough that it gets its own high-level goal So it is critical and for our department, you know We don't engage in any project like this without first going to the planning department and saying hey What is the potential for housing here? What do you see? What what would we lose if we conserved this property? So that was really step one for us and This is a you know my it's a little bit of dangerous territory of just saying my opinion, but You know This property has been known by the Hainese who you know, obviously folks know Hainee Realty incredibly well connected Realtors for decades and decades if it could have been developed into a neighborhood it Housing it almost certainly would have If you look at the neighborhood and and and most of you live there so you can see the top of graphic lines Pretty much the area where they're far apart is where all the houses are and If you look at this property You have a very steep hill on this side. You have a steep hill on this side and in the middle is all wetland so the The development for this part potential for this parcel is expensive very expensive and we actually Tried to work with the Hainese because housing is an important goal for the city And also for them we tried to work with them to Have housing be a component of the development of this property And in the end for a variety of reasons without going too far into the weeds We decided that it was simpler and a better outcome overall to conserve the whole property because the housing potential for this property is so low and so expensive and And it you know if anyone is curious about how that thought process unfolded I'd be happy to go further into that, but I'll keep it. I'll keep it at that for now Yeah, all right, so Just to give you a sense of how this all unfolded the Hainee property has been sort of on and off the market for some years but in the in the fall of 2020 it came on the market and and People started talking about it, you know, I certainly heard about it as the as the Parks director at that, you know the newish parks director say hey this property is on sale Is there any chance it could become part of the park and what's the story with it? And so we started thinking about it. We had these neighborhood community meetings, which most of you came to To assess the interest we talked to the planning department and the city council and the and the property owners and We decided to move forward with this grant application through through their community forest program to pay for half of the parcel In the interim Let me just go back here to the Johnson parcel. I guess you could see it here, too In the interim this woman April Johnson was interested in having her land become part of the public Benefit, you know, she she was motivated to see it be enjoyed by everyone and so We were able to actually include her property in the project through the grant application Which was a real a real blessing because we did end up getting the grant and they're willing to fund basically half of the project cost So once we got that it was real Very real and We Concurrently applied for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars through the Vermont Housing Conservation Board aka VHCB, which is the maximum they'll give for a local conservation project local conservation and We go before the board on on December 7th, and so that's not in the bag yet, but it's it's expected And then we got thirty eight thousand dollars in pledges just from local folks Right off the bat and our initial ask way back in January before we had two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in grant money and before any applications was Hey, if this became a reality What are you willing to throw in and if we can show the grant funders that we have some percentage of this project in the bag They're going to be a lot more likely to fund the project because they're going to see that local support So that was really critical that thirty eight thousand dollars that went into every application I was highlighted and It was a strong part of our our pitch not only to the grant funders But also to you know our local local council and local decision-makers to say, you know People aren't just telling me they want this there. They're willing to throw down money for it So there was a long and twisted road that I won't recover I won't recount every twist to how we got purchase and sales agreements with the landowners, but Fairly recently within the last few months after the appraisals came in we got purchase and sales agreements with the landowners and We After all is said and done with all the expected money between the pledges and the different grants We're about a hundred thousand dollars short. So we launched this capital campaign to try to close close that gap by the end of the year and That's how we find ourselves here We're hosting a number of upcoming events. We have a zoom meeting tomorrow night for folks I want to learn more about the project with the fundraiser planned and more fundraisers in the works But we're just rolling them out. So we'll certainly let folks know we also have Four walks of the property with parks director Alec Ellsworth. That's me I Tried to put them at different times and and days of the week so that folks could join if they want if you want to Yeah, if you want to actually put boots on the ground and spend time on the property with me and and sort of Look at it through the eyes of the park I'm really excited for those because they're beautiful pieces of land And I know that there's a lot of familiarity with them already. So I expect to learn something on those walks as well and Then as far as you know, how folks can help obviously donating is really the key to making this progress this this project successful a Lot of folks who pledged came back with more money You know, they said well, I'll pledge this and then I'll also pledge more And so that's great a lot of people have learned about the project and and thrown in some money We put a little option to donate extra to this project on the enchanted forest tickets and raised $500 through that And and so on and so forth. So we're we're we're doing pretty well for just basically having launched this We've got $10,000 right off the bat So I'm hoping that these info sessions will generate some more Interest and some more momentum and we'll certainly We'll certainly be pushing it if there's been a little bit of a lull the last few weeks for Just because my personal life had some bumps in it with a dev and my wife's family, but Now that things are back in the groove sort of In my work life, we're going to be pushing it a little harder and special shout out to Janna Over there for sort of keeping the train rolling And really making making a lot of this possible so Janna Janna is Keep part of this as well as the rest of our community services team and our parks team Yes People keep the light on so you can They are yeah, yep, I'll text deductible Yeah, any other questions As far as the mountain biker's go my nephew is a huge mountain biker He loves to go to work. Yeah Yeah Well I've had a number of people come up and say well I'd love to donate X dollars if you can guarantee that we're gonna have a bike trail from here to here and That's not really how it works. I mean I wish I could promise everybody has their own little interest for what's gonna happen To every every part of the park not just these parcels And that's our job to manage that But you know what we're trying to do here for all the mountain bikers who are really keen to see more property is Have this be part of the mix, you know, let's be part of the conversation There's gonna be a public process to figure out what the trails are gonna be What uses are gonna be allowed on it So, you know to answer your question For one thing like I can't guarantee that there will be mountain biking trails on the parcels I mean, that's not really up to me. It's up to the community and the parks commission to decide on that kind of rule And there will be a process to figure that out if and when we purchase this land and Just you know about the second part of your question about erosion and and there's, you know Certainly mountain bikes are a lot more taxing on a trail system than walkers And that there's just no no getting around that And we have a lot of mountain biking trails in the North Branch Park and we you know We're fully aware of what it takes to maintain a mountain biking trail so We have great staff, you know that knows that work. We have a ton of volunteers We have a mountain biking club Mamba Montpelier area mountain bike Association That puts in untold hours to maintain those trails I have the thousands of text messages from the group chat to prove it and I'm confident that if if mountain biking is part of the mix on this property or any property You know that the city owns that we're we're prepared to take on the maintenance of that Yeah, there's a there's a pretty huge range of what a mountain bike trail can look like from you know A little raked pathway that someone rides through the woods to a Virtually bermed out flow trail like we have in the North Branch Park and you know we we're trying to We're trying to get some trails that are kind of in the middle of the spectrum You know as far as thinking about the the lens that you know the public lands that we own aside from this You know, we have a number of trail projects in the works and we're trying to develop trails that can be both Walked on and biked on and also skied on in the winter because you know, it's Vermont. So a Lot of the trails that were built in the North Branch were very mountain bike specific and sort of our next like tranche of trail Building is going to be try try to be more of a true multi-use trail That's wider, you know less fewer berms and cut some things and make it both more beginner-friendly But also, you know more multi-season So there's a little bit more than two months to get What's the strategy That is a good question that's a good question Well, we're gonna we're gonna push hard to try to make it I think we can make it I'm optimistic If we come up short There there's more pressure there's more time pressure to buy than a Haney property than there is the Johnson property So because it's a pretty complicated mix of like, you know multiple different grant sources and private dollars What we really want to do is purchase the whole thing all at once and you know Take care of all our grant management and all our donors and just make it very clean like this is one project But in theory, you know, we could purchase the Haney property by the end of the year Because that's their wish and work with the Johnson property You know who as I mentioned is somebody who's more, you know, their whole motivation is to put this land into public use So so we would have money now to purchase the Haney property So there's not a I'm sure let's work hard to get to 90,000, but it doesn't sound like we're on a cliff where We stand to lose it all it sounds like we're in a pretty good position Yeah, I mean we we only have our purchase and sales agreement is over at the end of the year with the Haney So, yeah, if we don't purchase it by then you know, we We would need to renegotiate but it that way We it's this our option with the Johnson property is the same, but you know Sort of my guess is that's that's more flexible. Yeah It's the whole thing, yeah, the whole project Somewhere in there, yeah What are your what are your thoughts on that tell me more I think you should just to meet with their their Their shareholders or whatever their client and see if there any of their clients have stopped giving Yeah, that that is the city's the city's Stock, I don't know how you describe it. Obviously. I don't know about these things the city's shareholder Investment manager is maple capital So our finance team, which does not include me has met with maple capital to Figure out how to take stock donations. Is that is that what you mean by that or was there like a further? Okay, yeah, yeah Okay, yeah, I thought there might have been a further fundraising opportunity through maple capital But no, if someone wants to donate stock then yeah by all means All right say no more Oh nice great Yeah, I'm I'm open to any and all ideas at this point No negative feedback You know people have questions, you know specifically mostly about housing yes, because that's I think on everyone's mind And then a lot of questions that we face like we face with any other park land Management and how you how are you going to carry this land and staffing etc etc? You know, so there are a few questions, but nobody that's been like I think this is a terrible idea And you know, I don't want to see it. I'm gonna actively work against you How that's we recently how likely it might be that an additional shelter would be constructed That's feasible on the land somewhere like how how The team is imagining access Like, you know any little parking lot like we have at the couple different entrances Yeah, that's a great question. I'm glad you I'm glad you passed that on because that's a critical point that We talked about in our neighborhood meetings, but I didn't cover here, which is that let me go back to the map So As far as access goes, you know, one of the great parts about this project is it it Formalize us permanently the neighborhood access And that's not just for the butters, but there's also a right-of-way that goes right through here out to Derry Lane It's just a 16-foot swath of land that can go to Derry Lane and This is a really key point that I want to emphasize that we we do not intend to Direct people to get to Hubbard Park by that entrance. It'll be no parking facility It'll be a very low-key neighborhood access And you know, we'll work closely with the folks that live adjacent to that to make sure it's as as minimally intrusive as possible Like I said, it's a pretty leaky border, you know, people go in how they want to go in or whatever relationships they have But that is that is the main plan to access. We don't plan to build any Parking area or anything Basically keep it as a neighborhood access And then as far as shelters go Purchasing this land with federal the federal program is quite restrictive it can never be developed and There are some Openings for you know, recreational structures or things of that nature And that is really sort of Out of at least, you know my decision-making at this point That is really up to the parks commission, you know and the public who So they draw from and they hear from as you know, if somebody wants a shelter there then that could be a project That would be discussed in the future My personal opinion is you know at this point I think if we were to gain these properties as part of the park we would need to focus on Formalizing the trails like you could see that it's a crazy rats nest of trails over here We would need to close down the ones that go through wetlands. We would need to improve the ones that are good We're you know potentially create new ones work with the neighborhood to figure out Okay, where do we really want trails and then let's sign them so that people know where they're going Let's put you know, no trespassing private property signs at the edges where all these like little neighborhood trails are And that would be our priority is to like get Get these properties to look and feel more like Hubbard Park before we Really go into any kind of shelters or that's not at least on my personal short list for this project But again, that's not entirely up to me I don't think we have a maximum capacity for the walks and you can just show up there's no sign up But just I'll be there and you can come Be there rain or shine and Yeah depends on how far we want to go or how hard he already the group is Yeah, let's get in there. It's gonna get there. I tried to make that the latest one so that maybe we have light to get back by Great Well, that was relatively short and sweet. Thanks for coming. Appreciate you all coming And To relay the story that I think I'd go in differently than you all go. Yes. That's that's why You Go downhill When I first moved to town I lived on Clare Denabiner I was telling you some of you and I used to walk back here I Live down here and I walk and walk all in here and I go up and there's this huge plateau up here And oh man I had so many great times just walking and walking and then one time I got lost and I popped out Right over here like onto the seven fireplaces road It's just like a huge road, you know, it's like a you cars can drive on it and I was like, what is this? And my first honestly my first reaction was like, this is awful that's like this super developed trail and You know, obviously have grown to know and love the variety of trails in Hubbard Park But boy I spent months and months just before I ever made it into the park or to any of the shelters or anything Just exploring all this by the land There's a lot out there Yeah Well