behind. Good evening. Today is Monday, July 24th, 2023. Thank you for joining us in person in Contoy's Auditorium and online for the Burlington City Council meeting. The time is 5.52. We will begin our evening with Item 1.1, which is a motion to adopt our agenda. I would entertain a motion to adopt our agenda as presented. I don't believe there are any amendments. Are there? I don't believe there are. Anyone willing to make that motion? Thank you, Councillor Jang, seconded by Councillor King. Is there any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all those in favor of the motion, please say aye. Any opposed, please say no. That motion passes and we have an agenda. We'll also note that we have Councillor Grant who's joining us via Zoom. The next item on our agenda is 2.1, which is a communication from planning director, Megan Tuttle, CEO, CEO, CEO, CEO, CEO, CEO, CEO, Director Brian Pine and city attorney Kim Sturdevant regarding the negotiation of an agreement regarding UVM housing. As this is a discussion on negotiating an agreement, the item contains an expected executive session. And before we go to motions regarding the executive session I would go to the administration for any update that you feel can be provided to the community in open session. Mayor Weinberger was there anything that you could update the community of in advance of our executive session. Thank you President Paul I think the community is aware that the city and UVM have been in discussions about housing and the university's desire to have greater zoning freedom particularly with the Trinity campus and after a period in the spring where those conversations that kind of stalled they have been active again for the last couple of months and I am looking forward I think we need we are not I think it's important to note we're not expecting the council to take any action tonight and we're some we're some time from being in position to bring to the council a actionable agreement but I didn't want to miss this sort of mid-summer opportunity to check in with the council share the progress of those talks and where they may be headed so that's the purpose of this session. Great thank you Mayor Weinberger with that I'll go to Councillor Carpenter. Councillor Carpenter if you could please make the first motion regarding the executive session. Sure I would move that the council find that premature general public knowledge of the information concerning contract negotiations and attorney-client communications regarding UVM would currently place the city in a substantial disadvantage with such negotiations. Thank you thank you Councillor Carpenter is there a second to that motion seconded by Councillor Barlow we'll go to a vote on that is there well first is there any discussion on the motion seeing none we'll go to a vote all those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no that motion passes unanimously now based on that vote if you could move the second motion Councillor Carpenter. Thank you based upon that finding I move that the council go into executive session to receive confidential attorney-client communications and updates on contract negotiations regarding UVM per one VSA subsection 313A1ANF. Thank you Councillor Carpenter a motion has been made to go into executive session is there a second to that motion seconded by Councillor Barlow any discussion on that second motion seeing none all those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no that motion passes unanimously we plan to come out of executive session at approximately 645 and then resume our meeting just a few minutes later so we're now in executive session we will be doing that downstairs so anyone who is in contours can certainly stay here if you wish and we'll be back with you in about an hour. So we are now back in open session thank you so much for your patience we're running a little bit behind the next item on our agenda is item 3 which is the Winooski River sewer main break expenses update and for this update we're gonna get a presentation or an update from DPW director Chapin Spencer who is joining us who's going to be joining us via zoom not sure if we've been able to connect with him. Oh wonderful how exciting so just by way of background we did receive an update on this important development at last Monday's board of finance meeting thank you so much Chapin for being here tonight we'll let that we'll try not to let that reverberate too much I don't know if that's on your side or on ours so we've allotted about 25 minutes for this update and director Spencer if you could give us a presentation for about 10 minutes or so and then we'll go to questions from the council thanks again for joining us thank you president Paul and appreciate the entire council for taking time to discuss this important item here as folks know on the lie 12 there were extremely high flows in the Winooski River and our sewer main underneath the Winooski River adjacent to North Plant broke at approximately 3 a.m. since then we've been taking a multi-prone strategy of reduce the flows reroute the flows and repair the pipe and we've made very significant progress as we reported to the board of finance last Monday we started pumping and hauling sewage from above the break to North Plant starting a day after the break occurred and started at the temporary bypass work to construct a one-mile long plastic pipe from above the break to North Plant the following day two days after the break communications been central throughout the process and I appreciate very much the efforts of staff set up a web page communicate by front porch forum from on alert the beach closure signs for beaches within one mile of Winooski River and updates since last Monday's board of finance are also significant the hauling has continued 24 hours a day seven days a week that has enabled us to bring at least 75% of typical flows to North Plant for full processing in addition the bypass piping project has gone ahead very quickly thanks to the good work of our contractor a picture of the work and the delivery of the pipe is behind me that work is nearly completed testing on the bypass piping will begin tomorrow and if all goes according to plan the the force main the bypass piping could be a normal operation tomorrow in order to assess the condition of the pipe under the Winooski River and plan for what permanent repairs we need to make we need to get divers in the river and do additional dye testing the divers are under contract we have signed that contract and they are awaiting the river conditions both the flow and the visibility to be safe and effective for them to enter and do their investigation as it relates to dye testing this is a tool we use to place color dye in wastewater pipes to understand where the break has occurred and we're going to do additional dye testing our second effort this Thursday to better determine the length and the location of the break it's also important to notice to note that our communication with our state and federal partners is critical and we have been in daily communication with the state's emergency operations center and FEMA as we respond to this emergency break we have provided them documentation we've provided them contracts all in order to help Chittenden County meet a certain level of a desert disaster designation and I'm pleased to report with our help that Chittenden County has provided enough damages above a threshold to qualify the county for public assistance through FEMA we are waiting for their final confirmation that this threshold has been reached and approved but we are very confident that that will be coming in the next day or two the costs are significant the work to pump the wastewater by pumper truck 24-7 is expected to cost around $210,000 for the 14 days of pumping that's an estimate from when we started pumping to when the force main will be in operation the emergency bypass and the construction of that one mile long force main is projected to be $550,000 which is also under contract and as I said should be if all goes well tomorrow operational tomorrow in addition we have executed a contract with a disaster consultant to help us navigate the FEMA process for $20,000 up to a maximum limiting amount of $20,000 and we will be at the August Board of Finance and City Council to seek your approval for all of these contracts but they were not ready unfortunately for this Board of Finance and Council cycle in conclusion I do want to recognize the tremendous hard work of our city staff they have been working long and late hours to make this work happen the response has been a nights and weekends affair in addition I want to thank the new North End residents who have responded to our conservation notice in the northeast corner of our city where their efforts to reduce wastewater flows have helped us mitigate the outflows of untreated sewage into the Lewinsky River and into the lake also want to thank our state and federal partners who have been with us every step of the way and we are working daily to update our webpage and our front porch forum posts so we will have news tomorrow on how the testing of this temporary force main goes. With that I'm happy to answer any questions. Director Spencer are there questions or comments from the Council for Director Spencer on on this important item? Councillor Shannon. Thank you President Paul and thank you Director Spencer. I just want to commend the team on the communications on this I was fielding a lot of questions both from the public and within my household about why does the pipe cross Lewinowski and all kinds of other things all of which were answered in your front porch forum post so I think I tried to reply to that but I'm not sure who actually gets that email so I wanted to publicly say I think I think your team has done an outstanding job both dealing with a really difficult situation and communicating with the public. Thank you. Thanks very much.  Thank you. Thank you. Thanks very much. Councillor Shannon. Certainly agree with you. Are there any other Councillors who have questions or comments for Director Chapin Spencer? Well I guess that means that you gave a wonderful a wonderful update. And well thank you President Paul. We are more than happy to be available 24 seven and I will take calls day or night until we get through this difficult period. Thank you. Thanks very much and thanks for joining us on your when you when you are out of town we appreciate it. Thank you. We have a little bit of time until the public forum which starts at 7 30. So what we can do is we can take care of a couple of other items.  Is there any Councillor or the administration who wishes to offer a climate emergency report. Councillor Travers. Thank you President Paul. First of all I want to acknowledge that my sense is that there's a number of people outside very concerned about the climate issues in our agenda this evening and and so I am sorry that a number of those folks aren't necessarily here to hear this update. But in case folks did not see it on the consent agenda I just wanted to make clear that there is an item on the consent agenda to stand up the carbon pollution impact fee that was approved by voters this last town meeting day. It is on the consent agenda because the next step here is that it's going to go to TUC and then from there to the ordinance committee before it ends up coming back to the full council. But as we are sort of addressing our climate emergency head on I didn't want to flag for my colleagues here on the council as well as for members of the public that that carbon pollution impact fee ordinance is on our consent agenda to hopefully move forward sooner than later. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks Councillor Travers. Is there any other Councillor or the administration wishes to offer a climate emergency report. Seeing none we'll close out that item. I believe that we are able attorney sort of into to go to our local control commission. Is that correct. OK. So since we do have a little bit of time we will we will recess the council meeting at seven twenty and go to the local control commission which is one of two other meetings that we need to attend to the other is the local cannabis control commission meeting. And moving on to that agenda. The first item on that agenda is one point one which is a motion to adopt the agenda. Commissioner Shannon move to adopt the agenda. Thank you so much. Commissioner Shannon seconded by Commissioner Travers. Is there any discussion on that motion seeing none. All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Any opposed please say no. Thank you so much. We have we have our agenda. The next item is item number two which is our consent agenda. I will go to commissioner Shannon who for those who are just joining us for the first time. This is another meeting that we have in addition to the city council meeting to do with local control items. And I will go to the chair of the license committee who deals with that which is commissioner Shannon. You want a motion on the consent agenda. Yes and to take the actions as indicated. Yes I moved to adopt the consent agenda and take the actions and dedicated. Thank you commissioner Shannon seconded by commissioner Travers. Is there any discussion on that motion. Seeing none. All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no. That motion passes unanimously which leads us to item number three. A festival permit application for two days only. Item 3.1 Halversett for Halversons. Commissioner Shannon move to approve the two day only festival permit application for Halversons 1016 Church Street Friday August 4th 4 to 10 PM and Saturday August 5th 4 to 10 PM. Motion made by commissioner Shannon. Thank you. Seconded by commissioner Travers. Is there any discussion on that motion. Seeing none. All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no. That motion passes unanimously and seeing no other items on this agenda and hearing no objection will adjourn the local control commission meeting at 720 and call to order the local cannabis control commission meeting at the same time. The first item on that agenda is the is 1.1 which is a motion to adopt the agenda. Commissioner Shannon. I moved to adopt the agenda. Thank you commissioner Shannon. Seconded by commissioner Travers. Any discussion on the motion on the agenda to adopt the agenda. Seeing none. All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no. We have our agenda. The second item is item number two which is the 2023 cannabis applications and we have two cannabis applications. The first is for barking dog farm and the other and the second is burn living organics. It's been our practice to ask if there are if the owners of these two businesses or one of these but each of these businesses is present this evening either in con toys or online. You're under no obligation to do so but because the applications do not come forward to come to us with a lot of information. We do offer these entities an opportunity to introduce themselves and their business. So if you're joining us online if you're one of the two businesses joining us online you can just simply use the raise hand function or if you're here in con toys and want to raise your hand. We're happy to have you come come forward. Introduce yourselves. Tell us about your business where it's located if you so choose. So I will look online and in fact there is one of the one of the owners is joining us online. So I will go to you Tito and thank you so much for joining us. Hi everybody can you hear me okay. Yes we can. Hi so I apologize for not being there. I always try to be at all these meetings in person but I had to go to a wedding and I just got back like within the hour but I apologize it can't be you but I am here. If there's if there's anything that you want to tell us about about your business where it's located or anything else this is your oh sure we can sort of this sort of your opportunity for a little free advertising. Got you okay yeah of course well we are at burn gallery right adjacent to city hall park and we've been there for almost 20 years and we this is basically just a continuation of our plan we we've always had glass going inside the store we still do but we have that we have the glass going split into two parts one in the front station and then two glass going stations in the back of the store and so instead of glass blowing now we've changed it to be cannabis processing. So in the same way though that you could look through the window and see the glass blowing now you'll be able to look through the window and see trimming and ice water extraction and rosin pressing. We're not going to be using any solvents or doing anything like that. It's going to be pretty simple and we plan on just continuing our tradition of excellence that we always strive for and and that's it. No changes other than that. Great thank you and thanks again for taking the time to join us on the account. I don't know if the other if the other business is here. President Paul I have some information about the other business. Okay great thank you. They were expecting to have the meeting commenced at eight o'clock so they would have been here and they're available to answer questions that people have them going forward but they appreciate you considering their application. You know you are correct. Due to the way Civic Clerk works we do have to put times in and I assume that we would start public forum and we would go to that item after. I assume that they're just not available to to join us now. Is that correct. That's correct. You know if they do come in later and they would like to do that we will you know they could do that certainly during public forum. So thank you. Thanks for bringing that to my attention. With that we will go to item 2.1 which is the application for barking dog farm. Commissioner Shannon. Thank you President Paul. I'd like to start by by letting commissioners know that you have heard from us for a long time that we are everything all of the information except for the name of the organization basically has been redacted from these applications and we very little to go on on for approval. One of the things we got clarification on is that and thank you to attorney Kyle Klaus in the city attorney's office. We had been told we had to redact the addresses and Kyle got some clarification that that is no longer true. So that's why you are seeing the addresses here. So in my opinion a step in the right trans right direction for transparency. With that I will move to issue a local control license conditioned upon compliance with all applicable city bylaws adopted pursuant to 24 vs a 4 4 1 4 and city ordinances regulating signs or public nuisances adopted pursuant to 24 vs a 22 91 to barking dog farm and transmit local approval to the state cannabis control board. Thank you so much. Commissioner Shannon seconded by commissioner Travers. Is there any discussion on this motion. Seeing none. All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no. That motion passes unanimously which brings us to the second application which is item 2.2 for burn living organics commissioner Shannon. I move to issue a local control license conditioned upon compliance with all applicable city bylaws adopted to adopted pursuant to 24 vs a 4 4 14 and city ordinances regulating signs or public nuisances adopted pursuant to 24 vs a 22 91 to burn living organics and transmit local approval to the state cannabis control board. Thank you commissioner Shannon seconded by commissioner Travers. Is there any discussion on that motion. Seeing none. All those in favor of the motion please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no. That motion passes unanimously and seeing no other items on this agenda and hearing no objection will adjourn this local control commission meet our local control can of local cannabis control commission meeting at 728 and will resume the recess city council meeting at the same hour. And with the understanding commissioner Barlow or if there's anyone else who knows knows the the applicant please have them you know registered to speak during public forum we would love to hear from them. This means that we will move back to our city council agenda. And before we move on with our agenda and begin the public forum I have a I have a brief comment that I'd like to make and we just ask for your attention for just a moment. Last Saturday many in our community were stunned and shaken by an incredibly tragic loss and I know that all of us at the council and all of you that are joining us here both online and in con toys. Join me in offering our heartfelt condolences to the Hartnett family. The hours last Saturday have become days and with them a family is mourning and grieving the loss of their loved and truly beloved child in a small community such as ours one life impacts so many other lives from the Burlington schools where Katie went to school and then shows to bring her talents there as an educator to Burlington Electric where Katie's mother Lisa works and is such a positive presence and to those of us who know and served on the city council with Dave her father. This is an immeasurable loss that can be like no other. Please join me in a moment of silence for Katie for her parents and to honor a life whose positive and loving impact will carry on in the lives of the many that she touched. Thank you. The time is now exactly 7 30 and with that we will move on to item number four which is the public forum. Before we begin public forum and you're welcome to come in and please have a seat there are there are other seats. Before we begin the public forum we have a number of people that are here this evening who may be new to our public forum process and what if you are we'd like to describe that process to you. For those who are joining us in con toys we have a timer system that is on the table in front of me right here and it has three lights on it. The green light will shine when you begin speaking the second light is a yellow light and that will shine when you have 30 seconds left and the last red light will shine when your time is up. We ask that you please complete your sentence if you're in mid sentence when the light and the sound indicates that your time is up so that everyone has the same amount of time to speak and we can keep the public forum moving along. If you are joining us online and we will and we will get to we will get to you online. There is a timer system that we have set up on zoom. We don't have a light system but when your two minutes is up the clock will wind down to zero and we ask that you please complete your comments so that we can move on to hearing from the next community member. We have a hybrid system for how we run public forum and that is if you wish to speak in person in con toys there are forms to my right in the back of the room. Please complete one of those forms there's actually a couple of people right now that are filling them out. Please complete the form and bring them to the clerk who is to my right in the front of the room. If you wish to speak by zoom you can do so by going to the city website and this is the address it's Burlington vt.gov forward slash city council forward slash public forum and a form will come up. You complete the form and those answers will come into a spreadsheet that I have right in front of me and that way I can call on you in the order in which you submit the form. It's been our practice that Burlington residents will have first priority. We will go to Burlington residents in con toys who have submitted a form in person then to Burlington residents who are joining us online then we will go back to con toys to non Burlington residents joining us in person and then back to our online non Burlington residents to round out the public forum. We don't have a lot of ground rules about public forum other than that you keep to the time limit and one other request that we make of you and that is that during public forum we ask that you please speak respectfully. We'd like to remind everyone who is here and joining us online that there are families who watch our council meetings as part of their connection to civic engagement. Parents are using our forum to teach our city's children about city government and responsible and respectful public discourse. Please respect that and please direct your comments to me as the chair and not to anyone else at this table. Please do not personalize your comments. Again we really want to hear what you have to say and it is so much easier for us to listen if you speak respectfully. We will get started. I do have one other thing one other thing to remind people of and that is that we have a public hearing on the south end innovation overlay district and you can choose to speak during public forum if you wish to speak at this time. However you can speak during the public hearing and that will come in the deliberative agenda. We have a couple of other things to do before that but it won't be much longer after the public forum. So if you have filled out this forum and you've said that you want to speak to the south end innovation district I will ask you if you want to speak now or speak later and if you want to speak later I will keep those separately and then call on you when we start the public hearing. So with all of that we will go to the public forum. So the first person wishing to speak in Contways is Romeo von Herman and the second person is Greg Delaney and my apologies for the fact that I'm going to probably mispronounce a lot of names. If I do please correct me. Delaney thank you so much. Romeo welcome. Thank you Madam President. Madam President it's good to be back. Mr. Mayor city councillors city administrative team fellow Berlin Tonians as we gather today to discuss multiple matters that hold significant implications for our city. I welcome key item that is listed under the consent item agenda six point four zero that is the approval to accepting planning grant continuum for care Vermont five zero one and permanent supportive housing grant agreements. I want to also share my concern in the recent devastating floods that fellow Vermonters went through and the flash floods that we continue experience through the sustained downpours. Firstly I want to emphasize the importance of improving or rather approving the aforementioned consent item agenda. These grants present a continued opportunity to address chronic issues of homelessness and housing instability in our city. By accepting and putting these grants to proper use we can further develop and expand supportive housing initiative by providing unhoused members of our community with a safe and stable environment to build their lives back. Let us seize this chance to create lasting change and make Burlington the city that values compassion resiliency and recovery process. As we continue to embark this journey to better continue support our fellow Berlin Tonians I equally want to acknowledge that the importance and the impact that recent devastating floods had. The floods have left many families and businesses struggling to recover and is incumbent upon us all to extend helping hand to those affected. By working together we can rebuild homes restore lives and ensure that no one is left behind. In conclusion Madam President the floods also serve as a reminder of the importance of climate conscious sustainable developments and preparedness that our city must undertake. As we continue to grow as a city let us be mindful that environment environment invest in the infrastructure that can withstand natural disasters and implement measures that mitigate the impacts of climate change. Thank you so much Madam President. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Greg Delainty and to be followed by Sylvia Knight. Thank you for correcting my misspelling my mispronunciation of your name. Bad writing. Do I start? Yes. Thank you. Quickly I've been living here for 35 years. For the last 10 years I gave up my car, cycle everywhere to St. Michael's College even during the winter. No no gas or oil in the house. Got a restaurant outside the White House when we came in etc. 315 member. I'm just putting I'm putting I put my my my words where my mouth is there. Just to keep doing but this is for those who supporting the following. Just keep doing and supporting the no upgraded F 16s to F 35s. Nuclear weapon equipped jets and adding to the climate change problem disaster. Ditto the military complex. Just keep agreeing and promoting the new plan for the developing of the wood chip factory and the pipeline to the hospital as an antiquated excuse that will only bring more probably will any damage more and add to the fossil fuel terror. And just keep doing and supporting the fossil fuel industry. Even if you think that you're compromising, there's no compromises with the fossil fuel industry anymore. The earth is not going to be the handless and the children and and and just keep wishing your children grandchildren and great grandchildren. How much you love them and care for them and tell them that you're worried about them for the future and you're doing everything you can. Okay, this is for those who are supporting those that not for those who are not. Thank you. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Sylvia night to be followed by Philip Merrick. Good evening. Thank you for this time. Councillors. My name is Sylvia night. I live in Burlington, Vermont. My comments tonight pertain to agenda item seven point seven. The resolution number nine regarding aviation and ground emissions at Burlington Airport. My sincere thanks to Council is Bergman King McGee and I thank you for your time tonight or for their efforts on this resolution. As an elder citizen of Burlington, I live with existential anxiety and sorrow. Regarding the degraded condition of earth that my grandchildren are inheriting. We have all just witnessed extensive flooding and drought and extreme global warming event. And that is not the only crisis. Water is grossly contaminated. Many crops are destroyed. People will go hungry. We are causing the sixth global extinction event. We are experiencing a lot of floods. One F 35 burns 22 gallons of jet fuel per minute. When flying at peak efficiency. When it takes off. That consumption rate is higher. What do F 35 accomplished for this enormous expenditure of fuel in Burlington? Most of rising global temperatures and resulting crises. This rate of petroleum consumption is outrageous. Undustifiable and grossly compatible with global warming reduction. Goals of Burlington. The development of flight simulation guide in line with the city's 2030 net zero goals. I urge speedy and complete approval of this resolution and its implementation. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Philip Merrick to be followed by Catherine Bach. Good evening. I've been outside. Barely. So I guess in the coming months you guys are going to be asked to approve something called the steam pipe. Don't do it. Don't approve it. McNeil currently emits more greenhouse gas than all the cars trucks and residential furnaces in the city of Burlington. I don't know if you know that it's actually in it's actually on the city website. All those numbers are there. You can look them up yourself. You need help. I'll show you where it is. That's a lot. When I turn down my thermostat it's nothing because they're not turning down the thermostat at McNeil. It represents 47% of our total emissions in this community. And for that we get 30% of our electricity. Who heats with electric? Nobody hardly. A few people drive electric cars. 30% of our electricity for 47% of our emissions. It's really a bad deal. To express the efficiency for every 100 trees, 77 do nothing. Every 100 trees that they harvest and burn at McNeil is just carbon dioxide going to the atmosphere. Of course the other 23 are also, but they do create electricity. According to research conducted at UVM based on Vermont forest and modern forestry practices, McNeil and associated forestry that it depends on emits three times the amount of carbon emissions as a natural gas electric generating plant that would give us the same amount of electricity. I can give you that information too, but I got two minutes. I know I'm just one voice, but I expect you to believe the climate scientists, the UVM research, and the accounting principles that will back me up. We have 30 years of misinformation behind us, not lies, not misconduct, just 30 years of bad accounting and wishful thinking. That's it. All right. Well, I would be glad to help any of you understand this a lot more. Go and watch the forum and listen to the science. Thank you. Thanks so much. Our next speaker is Katherine Bach to be followed by Lucy Gluck. Good evening. You may be thinking, what is that old lady doing here again? I'd like to tell you why I'm here. It's for the children who are saying, it's so hot today, can we go swimming? And for their parents who must say, no, the water in the lake is poisoned by cyanobacteria. And it's for the elders who are saying, I'm so lonely. Can I go visit my children and my grandchildren? Can I go out and visit my friends? They're told, no, the air is too polluted for you and it's dangerously hot. And I'm here for all the people impacted by the floods and the droughts and wildfires and wars and other man-made disasters. And for the animals and the plants that are becoming extinct in the changing climate. And I'm here because as a boomer, I know that my lifestyle growing up is responsible for many of the changes that we're seeing. I do not believe that shutting down one wood burning power plant will solve everything. We have to make radical changes in the way we live. The proposed plan to build a steam pipeline from the McNeil plant to the UVM Medical Center is going in the wrong direction. We need solutions that don't burn any kind of fuel. And last, my dear council members, I have two requests. Please pass the request to count Vermont Air National Guard greenhouse gas emissions and to eliminate VTANG aviation and ground greenhouse gas emissions in the spirit of the city's 2030 net zero goals. And please vote against the so-called district energy proposal. Thank you. Thank you so much. Our next speaker is Lucy Gluck to be followed by Ashley Adams. Good evening. Hi, folks. Good to see everybody. So I definitely want the support from all of you for 7.7, this resolution, the climate emergency and a council request to count Vermont Air National Guard emissions. It feels like one of many, many reasons why the F-35s do not belong here. This is a military, it's a military installation that's taken over our skies in so many ways and health reasons, the noise, the danger is just one part. But the emissions are huge and if we can look at it and really be serious about our net zero goals, this is one piece that could really, really make a big difference. I also want to say as a resident of the Old North End in Burlington, there's a lot of us trying to figure out in our homes how are we going to make a difference. And even if it's small, we need support from the city also to help us electrify, to help us get off natural gas. And so the more we can look at what's happening in the skies with the emissions, with this military problem and what's going on, you know, on the ground in our homes and what sort of support the city might be able to give us to make that transition that'll help, you know, all of us have a cleaner environment. It's, as we know, everybody knows how critical it is and how scary it is right now. And we're all looking for as many solutions as we can find. And I do think that this piece around counting the emissions from the Air Guard is a really important piece of it. So I would like you to take that as seriously as you can and please support that resolution. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Ashley Adams to be followed by Pike Porter. Good evening. Good evening. I live in Ward 6 and I'm here to support the VTANG Greenhouse Gas Emissions Resolution. I want to thank counselors Bergman, King, McGee and Hightower for sponsoring it. In 2019, the City Council passed a resolution declaring a climate emergency, rightly stating that, quote, restoring a safe and stable climate requires a society-wide emergency mobilization on a scale not seen since World War II to reach zero greenhouse gas emissions across all sectors at wartime speed to rapidly and safely draw down or remove all the excess carbon from the atmosphere. To date, I have yet to see the necessary speed or scale of mobilization. The net-zero roadmap doesn't count nor is there a plan to reduce flight emissions at the airport, including the massively polluting F-35. This, in spite of the Air Force's own stated desire to reduce emissions, in its climate action plan, the Air Force recognizes that it is, quote, responsible for the largest portion of DOD greenhouse gas emissions and that reduction of fuel use offers the most significant opportunity to optimize capability while simultaneously reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The Air Force believes, quote, collaboration with surrounding communities is essential to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in that, quote, close cooperation with state and local entities and the American people will secure our common interests and promote our shared values. Well, how about that? That's incredible. With this level of agreement between the city and the Air Force, I'm confident that counselors will see this resolution as an obvious and critical next step in meeting this climate emergency at the scale that you rightly declared was necessary four years ago. Thank you so much. Thank you. Our next speaker is Pike Porter to be followed by Connor Wurz. Good evening. Good evening. Thank you for letting me speak. Perhaps the most important and most true statement in the VTANG emissions resolution before you tonight is this. To institute enduring advantages while combating the effects of climate change, we must fundamentally shift the way the department thinks, prepares and acts.  This resolution asks you, asks the state and asks the Air Force to begin a dialogue on how to lower emissions from the VTANG base. Fundamental shift will not happen in a vacuum. It begins with a dialogue and a plan. The goal of this resolution is the same goal of Burlington's net zero plan. Zero CO2 pollution by 2030. We may not reach that zero carbon pollution by 2030 and by the looks of things we will not. That does not mean we don't try. How will you, VTANG and the state bring emissions down to zero by 2030? I don't know. I don't know if anybody knows. I don't know how Burlington will meet its net zero goals by 2030. I do know that it will certainly not happen if we are not talking about it and not putting the question on the table as a goal. This resolution begins that process. Earlier today I sent you calculations based on data found in the environmental impact statement that suggests the F-35s might be polluting as much as 270,000 tons of CO2 per year out of the Burlington International Airport. We need to be clear about how much pollution is emitting from the jets and we need to begin talking about a plan to reduce those. This resolution is the first step. Thank you in advance for supporting this resolution. I would like to start off with a few questions to be followed by Jacob Berkowitz. Good evening. Hi everybody. Thanks for listening to us. I would like to talk about the renewable heating ordinance which is on your consent agenda. I would like to start back in 2018. I am 19 years old and I have just moved to Vermont. I have no idea yet that I am going to fall in love with this state because I have never lived somewhere else. I have been away from the place I grew up for a total of three weeks when I got a call from my mother. Natural gas main had exploded in my hometown destroying dozens of homes and killing at least one person. This is in the Merrimack Valley in the northeast of Massachusetts. So I go to college and I learn about the impacts of the climate crisis and how energy sources like gas, supercharge, and droughts. But I feel like things relax after that. My college divests from fossil fuels. This city council votes 11 to 1 to pass the climate emergency resolution in 2019. I think we're safe. We're not safe. Two weeks ago flooding ruined half the crop of the farm I used to work at. This after weeks of air quality alerts and algae blooms in our city. And then I learned that this city council the two subcommittee is going to allow renewable natural gas as an acceptable i.e. renewable fuel. Now this ordinance is an attempt to step in the right direction. I think it's like it's really good. But any city that permits the same molecular structure that blew up my hometown just because a company slapped renewable in front of the words natural gas is doing a disservice to the climate, to the citizens and the farmers that feed them. Thank you. Thank you very much. The next speaker is Jacob Berkowitz to be followed by Colin Larson. Good evening. My name is Jacob Berkowitz. I live in the old north end and I'm here along with many of my colleagues from UVMMC support staff United. I just wanted to take a moment and sort of introduce why we're here. We're in the midst of a pretty serious contract negotiation with UVMMC. We are over 2,000 of the lowest paid most mistreated overworked workers that work for the only level one trauma center in the region. And I just wanted to introduce us all to you. As many of you may already sort of know where we've been at. We won a landslide election in January to have the right to a union and we've been in contract negotiations with the administration for some about a month now and those negotiations are definitely intensifying and we're here to ask the city council for support of the over 2,000 of support staff workers which include licensed nursing assistants mental health techs, phlebotomists basically anything that you could think of that's not a nurse or a doctor at UVMMC of that over 2,000 most of them do live paycheck to paycheck about three fourths can barely afford to pay rent and around 500 of those are Burlington residents. So they are the backbone of the working class in this city and in this state and we just wanted to spend a little bit of time making you all aware of our current struggle. I yield the rest of my time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for coming. Our next speaker is Colin Larson to be followed by Todd LeCroy. Oh, you wanted to speak. Oh, yes. I see that. Yes. Okay. Thank you. I was supposed to ask you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Todd LeCroy to be followed by Steve Goodkind. There's a good disconnect amongst Americans left, right, all of you. You all have seemed to have forgotten how to communicate. You all seem to be living in your bubbles. It's disgusting the hypocrisy that I see every which way I turn. You know, I wonder how many people just lost their housing and flooding who were advocating for the homeless to be thrown out of motels. And now I wonder if you were to look at their political views on this, where they're standing on homeless help now that they're also homeless. You see, this is where it comes to unions, Americans, everybody, they only care about themselves and they only want support when they need it. But then, when everybody else needs it, they're not there. Or worse, they're against help. You see, the problem is, is that America and Americans have already defeated our own selves through the way that we treat each other, through the way that we are, that we treat the planet, we treat our children. It's just straight up contempt. And here's the irony. The rich and those in charge, the police, the military, they're all the ones who led the charge on treating people with contempt. And then, when it starts blowing back their way, because of the circumstances they've made, they go, oh, woe is me. Oh, woe is me. Care about me. You know what? Do you care about me? If you don't care about me, why am I supposed to care about you? Thank you. Our next speaker is Steve Goodkind to be followed by Amanda LaFond. Good evening, Steve. Thank you, President Paul. I think most counselors know that McNeil plant is about 25% efficient when it comes to burning wood and turning it into electricity. I think many of you also know, we've spoke about this before, that it really is good at converting wood into CO2. It's pound for pound. It's 100% efficient. In other words, you put a pound in, you're going to get a pound of CO2 out at that plant. Now, I know there's counselors who are concerned that what might happen if we have to shut McNeil down. And I would just suggest that we look to the Simpsons for some wisdom on what to do in these kind of situations. There's an episode where Lisa and Homer are sitting on the couch. They're watching the evening news. There's been an oil spill on Baby Seal Beach. And they can see the birds and the seals and everything covered with oil and volunteers trying to clean it up. And Lisa says to Homer, that's terrible. And she starts to cry. Homer looks at her and says, don't worry, there's plenty more oil out there. So I think if you're worried, counselors, about what would happen if we stopped spewing out 400,000 tons of CO2 every year from McNeil, all I can say is, don't worry, there's plenty more CO2 out there. So thank you, Counselor Paul. And I would suggest to the mayor that he should watch the three-eyed fish episode of The Simpsons. I think he might learn something from that. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Amanda Lafond to be followed by, well, to be followed by Colin Hilliard, although I'll ask you, Colin, if you wish to speak during the public, okay. Good evening, Amanda. Hello. As stated, my name is Amanda Lafond. I work in a lab at the hospital. I've been on staff there for around 23 years. With over two decades of experience, I've never been able to afford the health insurance. In fact, I haven't been insured, nor my son for the past 15 years. After one check, after taxes, I barely afford rent. I have to sometimes decide which one of my bills I'm going to pay or if I can afford food. Recently, my son had to have knee surgery due to an injury. And thank God Dr. Dinosaur went through after 10 months of fighting. Not being able to afford my own health insurance is one thing, I've learned to work for myself. But it means I can't get counseling for any of my health needs, which takes the toll on my mental health. How can we take care of our patients if we can't afford to take care of ourselves? The current... Oh, wait, hold on, sorry. There are times when I only have $2 in my account and I have to eagerly await my next paycheck. It's humiliating that thousands of employees live paycheck to paycheck in a level one trauma center. How will the patients feel knowing that those taking care of them can't afford the opportunity to take care of themselves? We would like to be able to live, not just to survive. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Nick Persampiari. You had asked to speak also, I believe a number of items, so it probably would be best if you spoke during public forum. Okay, great. Welcome. President. I'm here to ask the city to please overhaul its net zero energy road map. The city defines net zero as eliminating fossil fuel use from the heating and ground transportation sectors. That ignores aviation number one, but the larger problem is that it ignores greenhouse gas emissions from non-fossil fuel sources. The rest of the world defines net zero not as eliminating fossil fuel use, but as reducing greenhouse gas emissions so that they're balanced by uptake of greenhouse gases by our forests and oceans. And the problem with this is that it opens the door to all types of false climate solutions that are being advocated by, among other people, the fossil fuel industry itself, including Vermont gas. Things like renewable gas, green hydrogen, advanced wood heating. None of these things help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, some of them result in greenhouse gas emissions in excess of what you get from burning fossil fuels. And these things are appearing in the city's thermal energy ordinance that you're about to consider. And finally, I just wanted to shift gears and commend the mayor, the planning department, the city council, and everyone who's been involved in the South End Innovation District. I wish you hadn't limited the areas where eight-story housing would be developed, but I hope that passes. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Jody Woos to be followed by Carlos Escobel. You'll correct me when you come up here. Jody, thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much, and good evening. I'm Jody Woos. I'm a resident of Ward 2 in Burlington, and I live about a half a mile from the McNeill generating station in the intervail. I'd like to address the council tonight regarding the proposed district energy plan that will come before you for a final vote shortly. This is the plan to build a pipeline to carry steam to the hospital from McNeill, quoting from Burlington Electric's general manager, Darren Springer, with district energy, the McNeill wood-plant chip plant would not only produce renewable energy, but also provide renewable steam to help reduce fossil fuel use and support progress towards our net zero energy goal. Sounds great. District energy, renewable electricity, renewable steam, reduced fossil fuel use, net zero energy, what could be bad? This statement is actually the worst kind of greenwashing. It's based on Burlington Electric's long-held assertion that McNeill is carbon neutral, that the burning of wood emits the same amount of carbon into the atmosphere per unit of time as the burnt tree sequestered when it was growing. Unfortunately, the carbon neutrality of biomass burning, wood burning has been seriously called into question and should no longer be our working assumption. McNeill is not carbon neutral and uses the least efficient form of energy production through the burning of wood. Even coal has a smaller carbon footprint per unit of energy produced. Because of its supposed carbon neutrality, McNeill's greenhouse gas emissions are not even counted in Burlington's zero net energy plan, despite it being the largest single stationary emitter of these gases in the state of Vermont. So here we are. We're stuck with the dinosaur built in 1984, on which we rely for about 30% of our electric use. Oh, my gosh. What are our priorities? I'd like to call again, Ashley Adams, your wonderful, wonderful statement in 2019. We need urgent action, and I hope that when the district energy plan comes before you, that you vote against it. Thank you very much. Thanks very much. Our next speaker is Carlos Esquivel, to be followed by Jack Tiano. You'll correct me if I mispronounced your name. Hi, yeah, it is Esquivel. Carlos Esquivel. Welcome. Yeah, as you probably know, there was a climate rally right before this meeting, and I'd really like to see how many bikes were outside, but I also wonder how many of the people present here own a car or drive everywhere they go. The average weight in 2022 of a car in America was around 4,000 pounds. Now you probably know your own weight, so you can do the math. How is this sustainable to spend so much energy to only carry one person? I also have to acknowledge that this is not an individual problem. All the people that own a car and drive are forced to, in the majority of cases, in the so-called land of the free, people are forced to drive or they can't move around. I used to be bigger drivers. I'm still am, actually. Being harassed by a random person on a killing machine radicalized people very quickly, as you can imagine. So I do understand why a lot of people don't feel safe biking or walking around. I just really wanted to say that I don't remember seeing any protected bike lane in Burlington whatsoever. I have been...  Lastly, I would really like to see protected bike lanes, public transit, and maybe, just maybe, we can choose to house our neighbors instead of cars. Thanks. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Jack Tiano to be followed by Jack Hansen. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Jack Tiano, Word 5. I think most of you know me from my advocacy on the Southland Innovation District. I spoke earlier today at the mayor's press conference in favor of that proposal, and I have nothing really of more substance to add that I haven't already said. Just say yes to students, say no to more surface parking, make sure the inclusionary units are built in the district, and please pass it tonight. What I really want to talk about tonight is climate action and offer my thoughts as an engineer to the change we need and offer my perspective on a path forward. Here's how I see it. We as a city don't have the money we need to do all of the forward-thinking projects that we want and need to do. We also don't prioritize the money we do have well, but the shortfall remains. As a result, when we reach into state and federal coffers, it makes projects take longer when they need to be happening faster. We also take on the imagination of those larger entities. If the money is available for bridges and highways, what we get is bridges and highways or nothing. There's a hope that the federal government will mobilize the funding and resources to rebuild America in a green image, but that's not currently happening, and it's not up to Burlington if it happens at all. And so our dependence on those big pots of money are distracting us from the fact that a change in perspective can allow us to quickly solve our own problems by ourselves. For example, Burlington needs an active transportation network that moves pedestrians and cyclists quickly and safely through the city. One way to achieve this is through expensive, modern, separated road and cycle ways, which take years to plan and millions of dollars to build. We also designate existing streets as resident-only traffic, build some planters at the end that filter through traffic and let cyclists pass, and have a city-wide network implemented in one community-built weekend using donated labor and materials. Both achieve the same goal, but one is not seen as legitimate. To push your imagination further, what if we built up our NPAs, gave them more decision-making power and participatory budgeting practices? What if the city facilitated citizens' assemblies on difficult topics like distributed neighborhood energy generation, or housing demand projection of climate migrants, and those assemblies gave binding tasks for the NPAs to solve how they see fit. Every word might be tasks to expand their housing capacity by some amount over time, but they can also do so in a way they think works best for their neighborhood. I wanted to highlight that the climate crisis mitigation and adaptation is not just achieved through legislation, but the community decision-making to give my neighbors a shred of hope and a vision for the future and to ask city leaders to think deeply and seriously about the effectiveness of our current systems and consider what kind of deep changes are necessary to meet this critical moment. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks very much. Our next speaker is Jack Hansen to be followed by Emily Letterman, former Councillor Hansen. Welcome. Good to see you. Thanks. Good to see you. Hey, everybody. So I'm here as well to talk about the climate crisis, and it was inspiring to participate in the event outside. It's unfortunate, obviously, but a lot of what I think is driving the recent push for climate action is the impacts of the climate crisis that we've seen here in Vermont. But I think whatever it takes, we need to double down on our efforts, and I've been talking to some of you all about some specific items that you all are looking into, which are great, and I'm going to continue to engage with you all on that. But I think with this time, what I really want to emphasize is really the process and the way that the council and the administration deals with the crisis, I think needs to be looked at through a different lens. And I know that this body is capable of that. Having served during the COVID pandemic, I've seen this body move more swiftly and urgently and more dramatically in a time of crisis. I don't think we've made that shift, whether it was during my time on council or now, I don't think that we've really made that mental shift into treating it like a crisis and accelerating the way that we act on climate. But we have the tools to do that, whether it's an ordinance, this council can pass an ordinance in one night if two-thirds of the body agrees on it as an example, maybe it's passing resolution to actually set a different framework for how climate policy moves through, but I think we need to change systemically how we adopt policy because we don't have comprehensive frameworks in place yet for decarbonizing from my perspective. I think we're just scratching the surface. This ordinance regarding decarbonizing buildings is a big step to get those frameworks in place, but we have a long way to go, and we're going to have to change the way that we actually make policy to accelerate it. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Emily Letterman to be followed by Dan Castragano. Good evening, everyone. Thanks for hearing me. I'm a resident of the New North End, an employee of University of Vermont and a parent of a one-and-a-half-year-old, and I'm here to urge action on the climate crisis now. With the ongoing things we've been seeing, the collective trauma that we face, it's imperative that we make policy choices immediately. Specifically, I'm here in support of the resolution that's item 7.7 regarding vetang, and I know that the health of our communities, which includes our ecosystem, the lake, the air that we breathe is a priority, and the council needs to act in favor of that priority. We must resist the notion that capitalism has an ethics, and instead do everything we can to strive for the health of the ecosystems and the communities that we exist in. I support the resolution, most of all, because of the emissions. As many have said tonight, 22 gallons a minute are burned by the F-35s. Personally, also, the noise pollution impacts me many times a week. It impacts the health of my baby, who's terrified when they go over, ringing in the ears for 15 minutes, et cetera. But most of all, I stand here just as a member of multiple communities to ask you to support this resolution. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next speaker is Dan Castragano. To be followed by John Collo. John, did you want to speak during now or the public forum? The public hearing, I mean, public hearing? Oh, okay. Dan, good evening. Thank you. Good to see you, council. I was planning some other stuff and didn't really plan what to say here, but wanted to share some thoughts. I just urge all of you to wake up and just step up on climate, you know. The state is just getting hammered over and over again. Can't go outside because of air quality. Can't go in the lakes because of cyanobacteria. It's too hot. Got to stay inside with my toddler in the afternoons because they're heat advisories. Flooding is just destroying everything. It's just a taste of what's to come. We're pumping 54 billion tons of carbon into the atmosphere every year and we have 250 billion tons left until we cross 15. 28, where we pass catastrophic irreversible tipping points. You passed the climate emergency resolution in 2019 and you're not acting like it. A lot of you talk about climate and say that you care, but I don't really believe a lot of you. There's a resolution tonight on V-Tang on the F-35s and if you say you care about climate, vote yes. The roadmap doesn't include the two biggest super polluting facilities that the city owns and operates. 453,000 tons out of McNeil every year. The airport, if you count it the right way, at least over 200,000 tons. And the plan is to expand both of them. Count all of it. Embrace degrowth. Endless economic growth on a planet with finite resources is illogical. It does not make sense that we need a different economic system. There are ways that this body can do that. And one way to do that is to pass the V-Tang resolution tonight. Thank you. We have no other Burlington residents that have signed up to speak in Contoy, so we're going to go to those Burlington residents that are... That's correct. They are non-Burlington residents, so my apologies. I'm not sure which person you are, but the next person is Levy Silverstein. That is you. Or Levi. Is it Levi? It's Levi. Yes. Good evening. My name is Levi Silverstein. I work at University of Vermont Medical Center as an outpatient pharmacy technician. Right now, this isn't going to seem like a real problem, but right now my phone is broken. It's not supposed to do that. It's not specifically made for raves. And I need to come up with $275 to get it fixed. And my dad's taken me off his phone plan in October, which coincidentally is the same month in which I have to start repaying my student loans for a degree I never got. I've been extremely fortunate because for the first time in my life, I am scared that despite working for the full-time for the largest employer in the state, I will not be able to pay all my bills. And honestly though, my problems aren't that bad because my story doesn't even scratch the surface of the abject suffering as a result of poverty that my coworkers across the hospital experience every single day. I'm a 25-year-old single guy with no kids and a decidedly stingy father. I should be able to pay my way through this God-forsaken capitalist hellscape in which we live. My problems are enough for me, but I cannot imagine what it would be like to be a parent living in this city, working at this hospital, and making exactly what I make. It would be impossible. I make $21.68 an hour. Over half of the support staff at UVMMC make less than $20 an hour. That's why I voted for and joined the bargaining team of UVMMC Support Staff United because it's time for UVMMC to recognize that by not paying their employees enough money to live, they are committing an injustice. And until UVMMC recognizes the gravity of this injustice and takes action to correct the harm they've caused, I will fight. And that's why I'm here tonight. My colleagues and I are working with Representative Jean Bergman, Jean, on a resolution in support of a fair contract at UVMMC for safe staffing, livable wages, and respect. I am here to urge you, members of the Burlington City Council, to recognize the injustices being committed against your constituents, the impact these injustices have on patient care at the only level one trauma center in our state, and to help us pursue vigorously the cause of justice in the wake of these violations by passing the resolution in support of our union's first contract. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks very much, Levi. There are two others. The first is John Tesser Shrio. You'll correct me. To be followed by Elizabeth Manian. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. I'm John Tesser. I'm a member of the UVM support staff union, and I also work ED registration in the emergency room at UVM. The role of registration at the hospitals to check in, incoming patients who are directed from other hospitals, we take care of you. You come in by ambulance, we're there. We are most commonly the first people to meet when you walk in the front door. And as of lately, we've been dealing with some challenges and concerns when it comes to our work environment. The first as a patient facing role in the emergency department is staff safety. I and others in my department have been threatened numerous times with both physical and verbal abuse. I've also witnessed numerous altercations with patients and staff members where patients were not given where the aggressors against staff members were literally nothing was done. After that, there are numerous members of my department who are facing challenges in affording childcare, rent, utilities and groceries. We shouldn't be forced to decide whether to pay our bills or to pay for food or vice versa. How are we expected to care for patients when we can't care for ourselves? The resolutions that might come forward in the next months, we ask you to please take seriously and vote on our end. Thank you. Thank you very much. And our last speaker is Elizabeth Mannion. And then we'll go to Burlington residents joining us online. Good evening. My name is Beth Mannion. I live in Ward 3 here in Burlington and I work at the University of Vermont Medical Center as a surgical scheduler. I'm a representative of the support staff United Union that is working on getting a fair contract at the Medical Center. I am extremely lucky. The biggest fear in my household is whether my husband and I will ever own a home. I cannot say the same for my coworkers. Some do not know if they will have a roof over their head in less than a month. Some cannot afford health care for their children. Others cannot say they will go through a shift without being physically injured or threatened in person by a patient with no one to assist them. I know of others who fear to take any time off as they will be fired for simple things like family emergencies or child illnesses. We are asking that the community join us in telling the Medical Center this is no longer okay. That we who are lucky enough to feel safe can no longer watch as our community members, those who care for us and our family and our community suffer. Thank you. Thank you very much. We'll give ourselves a minute to get the timer up online and then we'll go to Burlington residents that are joining us via Zoom. Great. Thank you very much. So the first person joining us via Zoom is Chris Gish and Chris, I have found you and enabled your microphone. You should be able to speak now. Just need to unmute on your end. Great. Yep. Hi everyone. My name is Chris Gish. I've lived in Burlington for the better part of seven years, most recently in Ward 5. And I wanted to talk to you first tonight about agenda item 7.7 which is the V-Tang greenhouse gas emission resolution and urge you in the strongest possible terms to vote for that resolution. It's long past time that Burlington which owns the airport and has a lot of jurisdiction there pays attention to the exceedingly high levels of carbon emissions there especially from the completely unnecessary and if we remember a few years ago when Burlington residents voted against having the F-35s here a plane that residents never even wanted. The Air Force itself has acknowledged that they should and must reduce emissions from their flights and it's past time that Burlington gets the ball rolling to make this happen. The other thing I wanted to talk to you about tonight is the thermal energy system ordinance which is agenda item number 6.48 and to urge and if need be the ordinance committee and the full council to remove false climate solutions from that thermal energy system ordinance and specifically I'm talking about renewable district heat which is referring specifically to the proposed steam pike from McNeil and I'm talking about biodiesel and renewable gas as well there's abundant evidence that all three of these things will not reduce greenhouse gas emissions compared to fossil alternatives with a host of other negative environmental and social consequences like forest degradation, deforestation and propping up fundamentally destructive practices like landfills and factory farms. So please keep your eye on the thermal energy ordinance as it goes to Tooke and make sure that it has actual climate solutions as the climate crisis is coming to rest here in Vermont with the floods lapping at our CO2 generating station down in the intervail, the air quality of the cyanobacteria please it's time to step up and really take action on the climate crisis. Thank you. Hello, my name is Chris May. I'm a word to resident. Like many Burlington residents, I'm grieving the harm done to the intervail from the recent floods waste high water in the community garden plots and then the new farms for new Americans garden spaces washed out trails in one of the most beautiful parts of our city and the most incredible harm done to the many wonderful farms there. We all know that climate change makes extreme weather events like this more likely and more frequent. I also know that our climate today the extreme heat waves around the country and the recent floods closer to home is the most stable and the least chaotic that I will see in my lifetime. Meanwhile, elsewhere in the intervail McNeil plant continues to burn biomass and gives renewable goals. The plant is aging, it's inefficient and it releases greenhouse gases into our atmosphere. Now is not the time to continue to invest in biomass or McNeil. I urge the council to oppose any expansion to McNeil to oppose the steam pipe and invest in a real low carbon energy future for the city. Thank you. Can you hear me? Hi, my name is Erica Victoria. I'm in Ward 8. I'm an employee of the City of Vermont where I work as a mental health counselor for college students. I just wanted to make a comment on the climate crisis as someone who works with children and adolescents and youth in our community and as someone who's about to become a parent. I feel obligated to speak tonight to advocate on behalf of all of us but especially the generations of children and youth who are the most impacted by the climate crisis as they will be the ones to fight the climate crisis. It doesn't take much to realize this if you've been paying attention to what's happening this summer in Vermont. All summer I have been breathing smoke from wildfires including particles like PM2-5 which are incredibly dangerous to me and my baby who isn't even born yet. I can't swim in Lake Champlain because of the increasing amount of pollution in the water and dangerous algae blooms connected to rising temperatures. The historic climate crisis has been unprecedented and left thousands of people as well as ecosystems and food systems in danger. And I have also for the past four years that I've lived in Burlington area have been impacted by the brutality of the F-35s, a militarized plane that not only impacts our bodies and minds but also our environment through pollution. In fact the U.S. military is the single largest plunder on the planet. My child is literally being impacted in utero by the F-35s as we know and will continue to after he's born unless something is done about the F-35s. There's absolutely no reason why Burlington as a city should be allowing the F-35s just as there's no reason why Burlington should still be relying on fossil fuels for any reason or working with the military in preparations that are poisoning including our community and our planet. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to explain to my child why we live in this world that has known the data and known the science and continued still on a path of human caused planetary destruction. So the people in power in the city council have a responsibility to create actual change in our community not through symbolic acts but through things like removing the F-35s from our community completely and ending all contracts with fossil fuels and creating systems that safeguard people in the planet and the environment against destruction. Thank you. The hospital was that how uncared for my colleagues would feel and how unsafe it is for them to come to work every day. The stories that we hear from the emergency department where folks are requesting slash resistant gear because they are being assaulted on a regular basis and that's not made available to them where I work in an outpatient setting next to a 17 year veteran of our department who as calmly and quietly as she could drew a man who was wearing two handguns so that he wouldn't act irately or threaten her colleagues or any of the patients but she had not been able to get de-escalation training so she really didn't know what she was doing and then when she left that day because she was so upset she was penalized by taking unscheduled time off to go home and cry about how scared she was it is really upsetting that my colleagues who are here tonight feel lucky feel lucky that they aren't more stressed out feel lucky that they can you know get through the month and pay their bills this is the largest employer in the city this is the largest employer in the state we deserve not we're not asking to get rich we're asking to get by we're asking to be able to have healthcare to take care of our families to have time with our families and to extend this care to our community thank you very much our next speaker is Brian Forrest to be followed by James Lees good evening I'm Forrest of the resident of Wilson we're a community downwind of the McNeil power plant the biomass industry industrial complex has been very good at shaping their story as being one of the renewables that is good opposed to fossil fuels that are bad this narrative needs to be corrected all forms of energy that come from plants in one form or another produce CO2 and contribute to the warming of the earth doesn't matter as a planet there are new plant forms like coal oil or gas or new plant forms like wood chips and pellets switch grass, use restaurant oil or ethanol they all come from plants and add to the global warming crisis particularly the egregious nature of burning wood is that it requires cutting down trees that are the best tools we have to store carbon and mitigate the worst climate consequences while adding CO2 to the air at a greater rate than coal that could put millions of dollars to add to the old polluting McNeil power plant working at 25% efficiency in the midst of a climate crisis we have a clean source of energy available to replace wood chips makes much less sense when a so called district heat only benefits one client in the district would mean burning even more trees as well as gas and electricity to create the excess heat the planet wants to sell that plant sounds like nonsense to me 26% efficient it's time to retire McNeil stop cooking the books to claim that it's part of Brodin's net zero program when it's the largest stationary generator of greenhouse gases in Vermont and start the process of creating a clean replacement for the antique that is McNeil, thank you very much thank you so our next speaker is James Lees to be followed by Luke McNally good evening so dangerous CO2 greenhouse gas is invading our air and turning our planet into an undesirable boiling hot house with all its vast military capability the F-35 not only cannot stop this carbon dioxide invasion it's the chief perpetrator each F-35 burns jet fuel at 22 gallons a minute it gets half a passenger mile per gallon the F-35 is killing people and planet the people of Burlington and Winooski both voted to cancel the F-35 at town meeting and Burlington can take a step tonight by voting for the resolution of the V-Tang resolution under Burlington can actually do more and does not have to rely on the cooperation of others that are mentioned in that resolution if they won't cooperate because under FAA rules as the airport owner Burlington is empowered to set a reasonable standards to protect the public from the operations of the airport and to protect safety setting a passenger mile per gallon standard will sharply cut Burlington's aviation emissions protecting people and planet it will ban the F-35 training at Burlington and ban many guests guzzling private aircraft too but fuel efficient passenger airliners will continue Burlington will set an example from municipal airports around the whole country to use their FAA designated power to protect public health and safety, wildlife and planet thank you our next speaker is Luke McNally to be followed by Bob Atkinson good evening the forest inventory and analysis program data tells us that trees are increasing in volume and biomass in Vermont while total forest land is decreasing in acreage not because of forestry but rather permanent development what keeps me up at night is the conversion of forests to land uses that aren't forests allowing small business owners to generate an income from local forest products helps to assuage the financial pressure of commercial forests into oblivion instead of saying don't cut trees, let's be additive let's plant trees let's empower our land trusts to protect more land and incentivize stewardship our forests have endured irrevocable change in the last 400 years vital tree crops like beach nuts and chestnuts have been robbed from our wildlife by forest diseases just leaving it alone to rewild itself isn't going to get us where we need to be at this juncture only restoration can save us the state of Vermont, the University of Vermont are both thought leaders in this space we don't have 200 years to wait to grow old forest characteristics rather we can start managing for forests that mimic these conditions right now I encourage folks to check out this emerging field of managing young forests for old forest characteristics there's a lot of great literature from UVM I think Vermonters understand restoration through management we've just been through Irene round 2 we understand that anthropogenic activity has made things worse and that the same tools applied with a greater understanding of ecological processes can be employed to restore the complexity of our physical environment all of this and we're providing electricity without fossil fuels now we're going to use the heat at a hospital however it's dangerous to suggest that we can stop consuming Vermont resources and just get our energy and wood products from other countries where the regulations are a lot more lax than our own this is the knot in our backyard fallacy where we externalize the costs of poor and developing nations thank you thanks very much so our next speaker is Bob Atchkinson to be followed by Caleb Quittner good evening good evening councillors Mr. Mayor I work as a volunteer for a small town with Plainfield as energy coordinator I've had that job for 14 years and probably a little more I've also became an energy auditor working for the CAP agencies in 1988 and briefly lived in Burlington years 74-75 so I'm here tonight as a grandfather by marriage and I try since my retirement from the state of Vermont agency of transportation two years ago to find myself busier than ever this is it this is what people have told you about is coming down the pipe and today a week ago it dumped in your backyard and if you don't believe that just drive through the city of Montpelier city of Berry and take a deep breath of the molding garbage that's been turned into garbage by high water these are people's lives these are people that can't go to work tomorrow morning these are people that are hurting their parents to cover their loss every day I wake up and I try to think of what I can do the best in my life that I've got left to turn this beast around every night when I go to bed I try to think if I've accounted to myself to my grandchildren and to the rest of the citizens of this planet and species of this planet to do the best job that I can we all grew up under the drunken behavior of fossil fuels and now we know that it's turned into a death project they don't give a crap the banks of Fundum don't give a crap we have administrations in the world that don't give a crap because they think that the fossil fuel money is their heyday bullshit we need to keep going with due apologies for the word we need to keep doing everything we can every day of our lives to turn this around thank you thanks very much so our next speaker is Caleb Quitner to be followed by Nick Anderson Nick did you want to speak during the public hearing it's just so nervous it all hangs in the balance don't be nervous this is not a joke although I think we can approach the issue with perhaps light hearts we can do so meaningfully lives are being lost I'm really grateful none of the people I know have been lost due to climate change as far as I know but I think we're past that tipping point that we're always referring to even if we stop the CO2 from going into the atmosphere we're pretty much screwed unless we come up with a machine to absorb all the CO2 which actually already exists it's called trees and plants so I just wanted to tell a quick story two stories about the parallel the soul and the heart I'm a person with mental illness and I lived in Winooski so I keep trying to get better and have more peaceful happy thoughts all the time but I walk in and there's a gun in my face and there's a cop with a gun in my face but it's dangling there and there's reasons for this it's for my safety ultimately yet I think the jets are not for my safety really I think they're only there for financial reasons because they could have been put somewhere else and I don't know I'm not an economist so I'll stick to what I do know that there's also another problem going on of the I think of the heart where the earth is our heart and we keep damaging her and she really wants to heal or him if you prefer but anyways I'll go with the mother earth tradition that this is where we get our resources this is where we get our birth in our life and we have to stop causing damage before we can discuss how to really make the help help our heart in the mother earth which gives my body its nutrients so and my time is up but I'd just like to say finally that if you want to stop the climb the chief of the center of pediatrics neurology came out with the de facto statement that they're really shocked and stunned that the F-35s were put in this neighborhood the damaging effects are comparable to lead poisoning in young people and developing minds so I'm just like why do I feel like this is like we're pleading with you guys like I think we're all into this together and I can't change your brain but I appreciate your kindness and gracious ears thank you, thanks so much so we will go back to we will go back to those people that are joining us online there's a couple of non-burlington residents that are joining us online there's also I did notice be earlier Bill Caffee that you had your hand raised I don't know if it's to speak to this to public forum or to the southern innovation public hearing but I've enabled your microphone Bill if you'd like to go ahead thank you I would like to go ahead and I am speaking about the southern innovation zone I just don't have I have a commitment later on sure go ahead I own a company called Mighty and we employ 12 people and we're planning on creating many more good paying jobs in Burlington right now only four of those 12 live in Burlington the rest are not able to live in Burlington and have to drive so there's a climate issue tucked in there too and we're actually doing a good thing here I hear all these people talking about climate and we are not only keeping money in our local community and increasing personal interactions that we all crave we're also looking to reduce the amount of emissions from online shopping so what we're doing also will bring a ton of jobs to local independent retail shops in Burlington and all those people will need places to live as well our all electric delivery system will also bring more good paying jobs to Burlington and I feel very strongly that we need to create more housing for people especially where we have parking lots for vehicles so I just want to make sure you all know that I support the south end innovation district thank you thanks very much Bill we have four non-burlington residents joining us online as well Lindsay Foster Mason if you are joining us I'm going to zoom and I can't find you if you can just simply use the raise hand function happy to enable your microphone in the meantime the first speaker is Jennifer Decker and Jennifer I did see you earlier but don't see you now online the next is hmm is using the raise hand function so I'll enable that microphone I'm not really sure under Morgan thank you yes this is Jennifer Decker I was unable to change my name in the thing so I'm going by Morgan now I'm calling in to let you know all that I support the resolution relating to the climate emergency and a council request account V Tang GHG emissions and to plan to eliminate V Tang aviation and ground GHG emissions in the spirit of the city's 2030 net zero goals the pediatric neurologist who was spoken about earlier said that these are the side effects to the decibel levels that kids are subjected to and what what it does to them is it decreases their reading skills increases heart attack and mortality risk increases anxiety and depression increases attention problems increases aggressive behavior and children are the most susceptible to noise neuro toxicity add to that the crash risks over a highly populated area as well as valuable parts of our state that may have less human populations but good populations of the other species that help keep us alive in addition V Tang has poisoned the water and we are in a neurotoxin crisis between lead which is also emitted by the airline fuel PFAS and farming chemicals and pesticides we need to build housing in places that are safe for people that are far away from pollutants far away from the noise pollution and far away from the crash risk and very far away from the military culture that this country has gotten way too comfortable with all of this has got to change and I'm very excited to hear from all of my fellow citizens and residents of this country today and just very very inspired by all of you thank you very much our next speaker joining us online is Ziva Jason and I am looking for you and can't find you on zoom if you are there are a couple of people that are calling in if you can just simply raise your hand and let me know that you are that person there are two remaining people and the first is Carl Martin and Carl I have found you and enabled your microphone you should be able to speak now yes can you hear me yes we can thank you my name is Carl Martin I am a resident of Montpelier our hobbled state capital and I as with other occasions when I have spoken to the city council I would like to thank you because fossil fuel emissions and the resulting global heating and ecosystem failure that result from them do not recognize municipal county or any other such man made barriers in brief I support resolution 7.7 to count and then ultimately to eliminate city's net zero goal and I will add that we should keep in mind that the first of these is very modest relative to what we need to do and what's coming since counting greenhouse gas emissions is not cutting them and that's the real goal of our efforts I'd like to add personally as a resident of Montpelier that I'm seeing in our great hinged downtown the physical wreckage and the human trauma that is enabled by the derisory climate action of so-called leaders both municipal, state, national and international and finally I must express my support for the UMMC workers who have spoken tonight the same pathological quote-unquote growth led capitalist system that has brought us planetary collapse also by its very nature of presses and squeezes working people every day while it hoards and squanders the communal wealth that is needed for the climate transition and for social well-being this is one fight I thank you all for your attention to both of these urgent matters and some of the other related environmental issues that were raised tonight thanks so much thank you very much so our last speaker is Peter Duvall and I am here earlier and unfortunately do not see you now so again there are a couple of people that are phone call-ins if you are one of them please let me know there is one other person who has now raised their hand Rob Thornton Rob I've enabled your microphone if you'd like to go ahead thanks very much President Paul my name is Rob Thornton I'm the president of the International District Energy Association I'd like to urge the council to support the expansion of district energy in Burlington we'll provide some follow-up written comments to this session IDA is a non-profit association we have about 3,000 members in 28 countries majority are here in North America operating, owning district energy systems in cities, communities and campuses there are about 660 operating district energy systems in North America certainly major cities Boston, New York, Denver other cities St. Paul, Hartford, Omaha, Montpelier and then also campuses like UVM, UNH, Harvard the district energy industry is growing last year our members reported adding over 52 million square feet of new customers globally 110 million square feet since we've been recording this in 1990 over 2.8 billion square feet of customer space has been added biomass is growing especially in the European Union the European Parliament in the fourth quarter voted to retain biomass as a renewable capacity biomass represents over 60% of all European renewable capacity and the policy drivers are of course energy security resiliency and efficiency UN environment supports district energy as a key strategy to carbonize heating particularly as global populations densify the district heating sector about 6% is currently biomass I just wanted to share an analogous an analog for Burlington in Charlottetown PEI they use district energy biomass for their downtown the Queen Elizabeth Hospital and the University and they've had a 90% reduction in landfill so I'd urge the city council to take the to join cities like Copenhagen Stockholm Helsinki Vancouver and others where district heating is their primary decarbonization strategy thank you greetings thank you very much on Peter you fell and I live in Underhill I wrote what I believe is the the first and maybe only real assessment of plan for district energy in Burlington in 1992 and I just want to bring a historical perspective to McNeil and this steam pipe and McNeil has always been a loser of a project and we have to remember that Bob Young almost lost his job because of McNeil and he was a pretty serious utility executive and nothing's changed in all those years it's always been a bad idea to burn down trees to try to generate anything from them steam electricity to cook with them it's just wasteful and polluting and what we need to do is recognize that you shouldn't be getting this information from advocates it should be part of the package that is provided by the utility decision makers the utility itself the department of public service every single one of these parties has a duty to the public interest and to fully evaluate all of the risks involved in these projects and they have utterly failed they've done it before on Seabrook, on the Vermont joint owners contract and now again with McNeil it's everyone's responsibility including the city council to attend to the mismanagement and failure to be prudent and diligent on this project, thank you comments on the underlying ordinance and I think it would probably be helpful to sort of explain this because for those who follow planning and zoning processes it's a little unusual for us to go to a second reading amendments so if you could explain that and then whatever else you'd like to add the floor is yours thanks for being here alright thank you President Paul and councillors Charles is going to pull up a few quick slides just two slides to walk through the information that President Paul requested as soon as we can share the screen I think one of the things that we just want to quickly share is how the amendment has evolved since the last time you talked about it as a result of your ordinance committee's work and what looks different about it from their collective effort and then we will also tee up and let you know what the additional proposed amendments are that are on the agenda for tonight so go ahead Charles right so the ordinance committee introduced several changes to the amendment that include the following so the first there were adjustments to the sort of aspirational statements standard for all the zoning districts in the ordinance so those were altered slightly the revised height map if you recall there's a height map that regulates where four six and eight storey buildings are permitted and there were limitations on where eight storey buildings would be permitted specifically north of Lakeside Avenue the committee also modified options for reducing non-residential space in buildings to achieve more community benefit we'd be happy to explain those in more detail later also to allow buildings of sixteen or fewer units to provide non-residential space in another portion of that lot various uses that were not previously proposed to be permitted are now in the permitted use category the floor area ratio which is a regulator of building bulk and density was increased modestly from 2.25 to 2.5 to account for exactions of land in the dedication of right of ways the urban form standards were tweaked as well to allow courtyard buildings and also to streamline some of the green building standards for those tallest buildings and finally staff recommended some clarifications and tweaks to some terms in the definitions portion of the ordinance and also to allow rail corridors and the districts many natural sort of environmental barriers to account as a sort of block boundary in the block perimeter standards and one quick thing that I'll just note while Charles transitions to talking about the amendments is that these were really the key things that we thought were of the greatest substance to highlight for you in terms of the changes the committee made there are lots of other tweaks and clarifications and technical corrections that we were able to make through that process as well. Right so you mentioned the four amendments so there as follows so the first the ordinance committee in total recommended an amendment that would increase modestly the amount of service parking that's permitted on a lot Councillor Hightower proposed an amendment that would preclude off-site and payment in lieu options for inclusion area affordable units Councillor Shannon proposed an amendment that would prohibit dormitories in the south end innovation district and finally Councillor Traverse proposed an amendment that would return lodging to the use the permitted use table with some restrictions that are outlined here they would only be permitted south of Lakeside Avenue and would only be able to account for up to 80% the gross floor area of the building which they're located and also they would only be permitted in new buildings or additions to new buildings just like residential uses in the district. So that's it for this very brief presentation. Great thank you that's a great slide we maybe will leave that up there for a little while since I don't think there's any we don't have any others that are joining us online so don't go too far we may but we'll do the public forum the public hearing so we will open the public hearing and first go to those people who requested to speak during the public forum but wanted to wait for the public hearing and then if there are others that are joining us either remotely or joining us in con toys who wish to speak you can just simply raise your hand and we'll call on you in the order that I see you at the advice of the city attorney we are going to have a two-minute time limit which does meet the reasonableness standards for public hearing so we're going to set the timer at two minutes and the first person who wanted to speak during the public forum is Colin Larson thank you so much for your patience in waiting. Board 7 this ordinance through a lot of meetings which is kind of tough to do as a private citizen and to understand because I have too much time on my hands I'm going to say that I support it generally I think that you should do your your darn just to pass it tonight because we need the housing I shouldn't have to impress upon you the urgency of this crisis I do want to take a second just to say that I was disappointed in the slowness of this process as a whole fighting respect for the professional staff of the zoning department who had to explain a lot of this stuff over and over and over again so I think following this passage of this ordinance hopefully I think that the city council should really take a hard look at permitting and procedural reform for all of these sorts of up zoning projects, housing projects and especially infrastructure projects that we can designate to address climate emissions so I'm talking about whether it's transit improvements, cycling improvements it can't take 10 years to get an up zoning ordinance passed can't take 10 years to get a bike lane built so pass the ordinance and empower yourselves to move a little faster because I'm sure many of you are also frustrated thank you thank you very much our next speaker is Colin Hillier to be followed by John Collo good evening Hi Colin Hillier I'm from the Business Association I'm also award three resident I spoke on this today at the press conference so I'll try and be super brief the BBA is enthusiastically supportive of this amendment as the other Colin said I think this is a long time coming starting back in 2021 I believe is when we started community discussion on this and just would like to remind the council that the community feedback did show a preference for a mix of four, six and eight stories so I'm excited to see that this proposal does still include that we submitted a letter from a number of area businesses employing over a thousand people who have signed on in support of this we desperately need this housing our businesses need this housing workers need this housing and so yeah just hopeful that we can pass this tonight thanks very much so our next speaker is John Collo to be followed by Nick Anderson I don't think you have the microphone on if you just press the button oh I did why don't you start again I do that all the time and just want to make a few acknowledgments one for the mayor who initiated this process it's been 18 months since the 10 point housing program was announced I'd also like to acknowledge the planning staff Megan Tuttle and Charles Dillard they're unending technical proficiency and patience in really kind of moving and shepherding this ordinance through to where it is tonight and then finally the planning commission which prioritized the housing crisis and allowed the public process facilitating workshops public hearings and the like and the reason why I mentioned that is that I just want to remind the council that there's been a lot of work that's been done on this issue over a sustained period of time so if there's any one of you that feel that you've got the weight of the world on your shoulders I want you to relax because the community's got your back you know this ordinance represents a consensus and I think that that's really something that we need to you know it's a responsible well thought out measured ordinance to address and forward looking but the key word here is act I think that failure to act obviously that's going to negatively impact all those households and individuals that are going to be unable to live in Burlington but the other unintended impact is that that in failure to to increase the supply of housing in a market where there is unending demand we're just going to be pushing the monetary value of the existing real estate and for those of us that own real estate myself included and I think most of you that's really something that I don't think we really want to really be a part of so I encourage you to act and I think that's something that we need to really focus on tonight thank you thanks very much and our last speaker is Nick Anderson unless there are others that raise their hand thank you good evening Nick hello councillors Nick Anderson I work at Champlain College I just wanted to reiterate some points that I presented I think Champlain is a key component or a player in the community in terms of trying to ease our housing crisis and that includes dormitories and student apartments that we can build in this area where we can really help alleviate the pressure on apartments in the greater neighbourhood the more Champlain College has the the ability over the next 10, 20, 30 years to either build dormitories or student housing will definitely help us keep our students close help foster their growth while at the same time providing housing so I'd just like to encourage the city council to give the most flexibility we can in this zoning to kind of future proof it as much as possible so that we can help out the housing crisis and move forward as a community where we can house our own students without having additional restrictions on us Thank you Point of information Could we ask not to stay right now but to have that person available for questions during specifically the dormitories part of the amendment when that comes up Great Thank you I don't see any others who wish to speak I've checked online and it doesn't appear there's anyone and I don't see anyone raising their hand in contoy so any others who wish to speak will close the public hearing at 921 and continue with our next item before we do and as we get into the substance of our deliberative agenda I just wanted to offer councillors a gentle reminder as I did in an email this weekend that our council rule state that no city councillor shall speak for more than five minutes in a single round to the same motion if you have absolutely no desire to monitor or interrupt anyone please do your best to monitor your own time if you are speaking for an excessive amount please know that I'll do my best to gently make you aware of that and ask you to wrap up so that we can move on to other councillor comments the next item on our agenda is 7.2 which is the ordinance comprehensive development ordinance the south end innovation district overlay and for this I will go to the chair of the ordinance committee councillor travers for a motion on the underlying ordinance thank you president paul I would move to approve the ordinance amendment regarding za 2301 south end innovation district overlay and ask for the floor back upon a second thank you councillor travers is there a second to that motion councillor travers the floor is yours thank you president paul so you look at an aerial photograph of what we are now calling the south end innovation district and you see that it largely consists of paved over parking lots right now all of this district is in what we call the enterprise light manufacturing zone where good security there councillor jake sorry right now all of the said district is in the enterprise manufacturing zone where in addition to manufacturing folks could develop art galleries banks bowling alleys office space photo and recording studios and printing shops among many other uses but without surrounding infrastructure and more importantly without people parking lots are winning the day we have a housing crisis we've heard many people speak to it tonight we need more housing and this is a prime location for the south end to do its part in addressing this ongoing crisis we also have a climate crisis when this council recently acted to remove minimum parking requirements on a city wide basis we did so to promote denser more walkable more bikeable car free neighborhoods and the proposal before us tonight furthers these goals I'm excited to support it for that reason as well as folks have mentioned this proposal is the result of a lengthy public process with input from the community and multiple stakeholders it secured the support of our planning commission and after four detailed meetings before the ordinance committee it secured the support of our ordinance committee as well I firmly believe the version before us tonight strikes the right balance addressing our housing needs meeting our climate and sustainability goals while also responding to neighborhood concerns legitimate concerns around building height and neighborhood aesthetics by now capping the district to six stories within the site lines of Callahan Park and we're building to eight stories is still allowed requiring that it be done so in such a way that taller buildings must also be more narrow buildings leaving more open space and green spaces for the community now you've noted President Paul that there are some amendments and staff has noted that as well and the ordinance committee I should mention as staff also mentioned we were able to take a number of items but there were four items that were left for this council's consideration we'll speak about them in more detail here shortly but I think generally I can say that the reason why these four items were left for the council's consideration is either one we were not able to come to an agreement on them as a committee two we felt the issues were important enough that they should be discussed as a full council and three particularly with respect to parking we did have consensus as a committee but needed staff to fill in some additional information there and we'll speak about that momentarily but before getting to the amendments and any further discussion on the matter I do just want to say that I applaud the mayor's administration particularly director Tuttle and planner Dillard do we call you planner Dillard Charles is that principal planner Dillard for truly your excellent work is truly full of new people that will further support the South End's place as this place for arts, for culture for makers and for entrepreneurs so thank you for your work before leading up to tonight and no doubt your work going forward thank you thanks very much councilor travers thanks for that overview and certainly kudos to the entire planning ordinance committee for their work your amendments was requested by all four members of the ordinance committee so councilor travers I'm hoping that you would be willing to move that amendment this is the one identified is SEID amendment CCOC it took me a while to figure that out but that's city council ordinance committee so if you were willing to move that please unless there's someone else that you would prefer to do that no I think that makes sense this is with respect to I'm sorry is this surface parking or inclusion alright thank you so we would move to amend the underlying ordinance to include the amendment identified as the SEID amendment CCOC with respect to surface parking requirements and upon a second believe that the amendment would be available to explain the specifics of that amendment great thank you thank you councilor travers is there a second to that motion seconded by councilor shannon is there did you want to I take it you don't want the floor back you just want to give them the opportunity to speak to this so maybe you could just give us a quick overview and then we'll go to councilor questions so the number of surfaces surface parking spaces were to be permitted on a lot and in the course of the discussions I think that number just felt a little too low and too restrictive especially in light of potential subdivisions of lots or assemblages of lots so we were directed to sort of do some math to sort of figure out a little bit more flexible method for this and so it is 25 spaces or 15% so I think this is a modest increase but it does allow I think some needed flexibility in light of some of the development types we're likely to see and it also includes a reference and clarification that this cannot be used to exceed the maximum parking limits that would otherwise be allowed okay thank you so much are there any councilors who have questions of the planning staff or comments on this amendment before we would go to vote on the amendment okay seeing none we'll go to the vote on the amendment all those in favor of the amendment as presented by councilor travers please say aye any opposed please say no that passes unanimously so that amendment is now part of the underlying proposed development ordinance the next amendment is SEID amendment as proposed by councilor high tower councilor high tower if you want to move the amendment and this is it says SEID amendment high tower then we'll go to we'll go to a second on that but I'll give you the first if you'd like to move that amendment great I'd like to move SEID amendment high tower to amend line 218 in the proposed amendment to prevent the inclusionary zoning offsite and payment and lieu options in the SEID great thanks councilor high tower seconded by councilor travers councilor high tower did you want the floor back or we can go to the planning staff if you have anything you wanted to say about it because I think it's also part of a larger issue and this wasn't part of the public discourse I think there's some this was not one of I don't think it met any of the criteria that councilor travers just mentioned this kind of came up in between when it left ordinance and when it came here which I think also speaks to sometimes the length of the process despite how many hands and hands touch it still doesn't actually quite meet the needs of our residents especially this didn't necessarily meet the needs of our residents who maybe can't afford to pay more than $1400 a month for a two bedroom but in short I do feel hopeful that most of the that this will pass it's an amendment can closing what I consider to be a loophole because at its core it allows developers to pay between $35,000 and $70,000 instead of building one of the most affordable housing in the country. So I think we need inclusionary zoning and the whole time we need housing but we also need affordable housing and I think our inclusionary zoning ordinance is one of our few pathways to making specifically the affordability happen and a major reason that I heard a lot of support for this is that we continue to say throughout all of these processes that we are going to have to move forward. So I think we should think about the south end if the south end innovation district becomes what we hope it will become I think it wouldn't even beat the eligibility requirements for having it off having it off site or having payment at loose I think we should just preemptively get rid of that as an option and I think we should be able to make sure that we have the best-selling ordinance and while this was an ordinance that was changed just before I came on the council and I'm a little bit ashamed that the payment in lieu is still an option and I do think we need to work through this ordinance to make sure come up with some win-win solutions like we recently passed with the units being able to be smaller. I do think it's important that we get it until we fix the inclusionary zoning. So I hope everyone will support this and I think it does close an important loophole to make sure that we do get 15% affordable units in the south end innovation district. Thank you. Thanks very much Councillor Hightower. Are there any other councillors who wish to comment on this amendment? Councillor Hightower for figuring this out. One of the challenges we have whenever we're reviewing an ordinance is there's a lot of cross references in that and that's not generally what is presented to us, not just in this case but in any case. So I do support this. I had some hesitance about supporting it because I think that SEID should adhere to the same standard that we have across the city and really this should be fixed at the city level, not just for this district. But I do agree with Councillor Hightower as we move forward with this. I think the only practical way right now to address this and as far as I know it's always been the intention to build that site. So I do think it should be addressed here. Thank you. Thanks very much Councillor Shannon. We'll go to Councillor Carpenter. Thanks. I was just going to say something similar and I appreciate Councillor Hightower calling it up and I'm to tell you the truth very embarrassed that we didn't discuss it. I think there was an assumption that this new zone now no longer commercial but highly residential would have the same kind of IZ requirements that we're seeing in City Place and Cambrian Rise and to be honest it kind of blew by us. So I do think this is the fix for now and there are conversations probably to be had about the whole IZ ordinance on a parallel track. Thank you Councillor Carpenter. My apologies. Thank you President Paul. Appreciate the chance to weigh in on this issue. I support this amendment as well and that I think it's the quickest way to ensure that the the large projects that are expected to come as a result of the zoning change and that are already in fact the planning which is already underway. It's the only way to with the action tonight and with the passage of this ordinance to guarantee that it will meet inclusionary zoning our inclusionary zoning requirements. Large projects should meet the inclusionary zoning requirements and we have a real history of success in this community of having the large projects through partnerships in large part with our great housing nonprofits, through the securing of major federal subsidies. We have a large a long history of producing inclusionary units on these large projects. What we don't have almost any history of is small projects producing inclusionary zoning units with just the market doing that. We have just a handful of examples and that's the reason why our predecessors just a few years ago did pass this inclusionary zoning ordinance that does have an in lieu payment in some cases. I don't think we define that right. I think that is an issue that we need to go back to. I think there really comes down to this project size test and that project size test is not in the ordinance. So I do think there's unfinished work that needs to be done and I don't think we should kind of demonize the idea of an in lieu payment in that that without in certain situations under the way our city currently works if we don't have that we end up with a lot getting built and that's not a good outcome for anyone. So I support this action tonight. We have more work to do on this going forward. Thank you very much Mayor Weinberger. There are no other comments from the council will go to a vote. So this is on the high tower amendment. All those in favor of the the motion please say aye. Aye. Any opposed please say no. The motion passes unanimously. So the high tower amendment is now part of the underlying proposed development ordinance which brings us to the third amendment as proposed by Councillor Shannon. Councillor Shannon if you could move the amendment as identified as SEID amendment Shannon. Yes I'd move to eliminate dormitories from the list of permitted uses and ask for the floor back after a second. Seconded by Councillor Berman the floor is yours. Thank you President Paul. I just want to say I was am I the only one ringing here in my ears or not everybody else's? The public banks are doing it a little too. Okay. Maybe a little more distance between us. Let me know if that has a negative impact. The I was asked would you prefer having dormitories or unsupervised student housing in this district? Unsupervised student housing is allowed in this district. It's not a tradeoff with dormitories. They can be built anywhere. And I also want to say that I don't see dormitories per se as problematic. Well managed dormitories are needed in our community. The problem that I have with this is exactly the same problem that we're talking about when we're talking about Trinity campus. We would be allowing dormitories to go into this district with no controls on them. We know that UVM generally only commits to housing their students the first two years that they are dormitories and this is the only form of housing that can actually increase our housing problem in that that allows them to expand their student body and not house the juniors and seniors. That has not been the practice of Champlain College and Champlain College is a property owner down there. That is not to say that UVM can't become a property owner in this area and it's also been said to me that UVM has not expressed any plans to build dormitories in this area. Up until now they haven't been allowed. So it doesn't surprise me that they haven't had plans to build dormitories in this area. I will also say that none of my constituents knew we were talking about building dormitories in this area I think until I alerted them on from porch forum this is a little known detail of which there are many in this ordinance but this is also not a NIMBY issue for me as somebody who lives next to this district. I am asking for the same policy here and same practices as I have defended for Ward 1 residents I do not think that putting dormitories down here necessarily is not a problem for other areas of the city because the students housed in them are not necessarily going to be housed in them for four years. So I also think that Burlington should be cognizant of the impacts of expanding our universities. It is great to be a college town and there are many benefits that we have in being a college town and I have a daughter that age with many friends that age it's a wonderful thing but everything in moderation and we need to be thinking about when we have 25% of our city's population is currently college population do we still do we want to continue to foster growing that population I think it deserves a whole lot more discussion at a minimum than what we have had in this case. So I would ask for the council's support in eliminating dormitories as a use in this district. Thanks. Thanks very much Councillor Shannon. Are there any other councillors that wish to speak to this amendment? Councillor Hightower and then we'll go to Councillor Bergman. I don't have comments I think I have questions because I was leaning towards supporting this and Councillor Shannon made the compelling argument but I do think it's a little hard because I think we specifically have Champlain College here asking for this which I think has been a good neighbor to the city and also really does what he can to house and I'm not saying no because UVM maybe hasn't been working along those same lines and that's a hard balance and so maybe a question to the planning office which is a lot of the housing that's being built now is student housing but it is not dormitory as it is considered apartments that are managed owned by university maybe by somebody else from the university and what are some of the things that we would be allowing with dormitories that we're not allowing with the student housing and I know one example that you maybe mentioned is that dormitories you can have not all year round so you might have like seasonal like term based leasing is there other things like that? The most fundamental difference is the ability to lease beds instead of full housing units in terms of the definitions of how dormitories differ from a housing unit in a multi-family building I think the duration of the term is certainly one aspect of it as well that we define it the lease term is based on academic terms really and we also specifically talk about institutional ownership or control of those beds so it's really envisioning something that's closely managed by these institutions where apartments may or may not have institutional involvement directly or indirectly as a part of them and then if I could ask one more question to Champlain College specifically which is sorry to make everyone move what so I do respect at least the comment that dormitories maybe wasn't originally what folks were thinking of when they thought of the Southland Innovation District and so I guess I'm just curious if we leave this amendment for now or leave dormitories for now for more discussion or additional is there anything that you all are planning that would be difficult to not have in the short term sorry to put you on the spot thank you for your questions and maybe I can allude to some of that information too but I think in the short term no we definitely see student apartment housing as being a desire of some students but we are actually seeing a large demand for our upper class students our third and fourth years to come back to campus housing prices in the general neighborhood are really high and this year we have a waitlist hundreds of students on a waitlist for housing because we don't have enough and they don't necessarily want to necessarily live in an apartment there's some ease around living if you're in a dormitory where you don't have to rely on going to the supermarket and getting what you need you can just simply go to the dining hall dormitories do provide that student a pretty good experience I think one thing that's also not included in any of the discussion points today is just cost of construction the cost of constructing a dormitory is much less than constructing an apartment building because you don't have as many kitchens and bathrooms you can kind of have multi-store bathrooms stacked together in one kind of room and you don't have kitchens with hoods and ovens and all of the other things that go in there so in terms of you know economically provide student housing dormitories is one of our most economical ways of doing that student apartments are nice and fancy and people get their cost of their their independent living but that does come at cost to the college great thank you answer your questions or yes thanks very much we'll go to Councillor Bergman and then to Councillor Travers so I'm convinced that this is the right amendment because everything I've heard about the reasoning for this upzoning in this district is to increase the housing stock for mostly working people that is not dormitories in fact if you sort of listen to the explanation it becomes more of a lodging and creation of a much more temporary population in an area that we're trying to build as a much more cohesive community I just think if I'm pleased that Champlain is interested in building student apartments I think that is good I also think that if students are closer to campus this is not closer to the Champlain campus build on the campus your dormitories I think that's what UVM should do I don't want to open that door and it just seems to me that we need a massive amount of affordable housing and housing that average working people you all have heard me before speak about my hesitancy about expanding housing in a way that precludes the expansion of commercial enterprises of the enterprise district as a whole and yet I have been convinced that this is an important thing for us to do so I really believe that allowing dormitories here undermines that and I just ask us to close that loophole and not allow that to happen thank you Thank you Councillor Bergman we'll go to Councillor Travers and then Councillor Carpenter Thanks President Valls let me just admit at the outset that I don't think the result of this vote will fundamentally change the neighbourhood as it's planned and we'll be voting against it many in our community have been saying for some time that we want the city's colleges and universities to take more responsibility for housing their students dormitories are certainly one way to do that we allow them of course in our institution zone but I think it's important to point out that if you look at our use table we also allow dormitories right now in our neighbourhood activity centres so dormitories are already allowed but I believe on the neighbourhood activity centres in the south end at Flynn and Shelburne Road in the Price Chopper Plaza folks may not know this but we allow dormitories in the new north end if folks wanted to build a dorm next to the bagel they could go ahead and do that tomorrow submit an application we also allow dormitories right now along Riverside Ave at least as long as it's in a lot of places we allow them to build an existing institution now leaving dormitories off the use table does not mean that Champlain College or UVM isn't necessarily going to build student housing there nor that we won't end up still having a student population in that area which I would welcome but if I were to say dormitories off the list I suspect that if I was Champlain College I would just build apartment style living that's managed by a private developer like what happened with Champlain College is great development building on St. Paul Street but in terms of I mean Councillor Shannon noted it and to me I think it is a reason to you know for those constituents that have reached out because some folks have reached out with concerns around having more students in this neighborhood my response to them is wouldn't you rather have a dormitory that is actively managed by the college that is owned by the college that has residential assistance on site that if there are concerns around students on the neighborhood we go to the college who manages the building to respond to that as opposed to a private developer and to those constituents that have raised concerns along those lines that is my reason for voting against this among others as to keeping a dormitory on the list, thank you thanks very much we'll go to Councillor Carpenter and then to Councillor Grant I believe you had your hand up, yes Councillor Carpenter thanks, I was going to agree a lot with Councillor Treverse and point out which I've researched a little bit that there are other opportunities and the institutions haven't chosen because there's no particular attachment they'd be sort of orphaned I think the work that Champlain is intending to do down there in conjunction with some of the other tech programs is a good step forward I think it's important to point out that Champlain does not have land on its campus to expand in so they'd be forced if you would to maybe put one down by the bagel or on Riverside Avenue so there's some logic and I think it's a little disingenuous when we've been pushing the institutions to house their students to then say oops but they can't go down into the land that they own so I just as they have said they're not going to rush to do it but I think it is an important option and I do want to point out as it's a less expensive option and I think we need to be encouraging those for the stake of the students as well Thank you Councillor Carpenter we'll go to Councillor Grant and then perhaps to a vote Thank you so few things I don't believe that dormitories should be allowed in this area I think that the very fact that we after you get through two of these amendment discussions will end up with housing that we desperately need we will end up with students living in that area we already have a large number of upperclassmen very much in certain neighborhoods but you know scattered through Burlington I think we will be supporting students in that area by i