[B]arre Mayor Thom Lauzon gave a private slideshow presentation of a five-story hotel and retail complex to the City Council and 17 members of the public Thursday night.
The press was excluded from the hour and a half long conceptual presentation and discussion about the real estate development, which is to be located on North Main Street and includes city land.
Details of the project have not yet been publicly released. Lauzon has said he has spent “300 hours” and the better part of a year working on the proposal. An architect from Boston is developing renderings of the project, which will be significantly larger than Barre City Place, a three-story development Lauzon spearheaded a few years ago.
Lauzon said he believed it was appropriate to block public access to the meeting by calling an executive session.
A member of the audience asked if there was anything he could share outside the executive session. Lauzon said no. At some point, he said the City Council will have a robust discussion about the project and make a decision about whether to move forward.
“Once the council has spoken on something I don’t see the harm at that point because they’ve made the decision,” Lauzon said. “I understand people are curious. I think any reasonable person after seeing the presentation … could come to the conclusion that disclosure [now] would be premature.”
The Barre mayor explained he would be presenting “background information” about specific parcels, and he didn’t want to disclose that information to the public at this time and potentially put “a certain individual at a disadvantage.”
Lauzon told members of the City Council that they would be sworn to secrecy and could not take notes during the executive session.
“I hope you understand that, and if you don’t, you have to leave,” Lauzon said.
After a brief discussion, Lauzon voted, along with three City Council members, to move into executive session.
The proposal includes land owned by Lauzon. The mayor said there would be no reason to recuse himself from the meeting unless he chose to speak specifically about his property.
Lauzon said he had the legal right to hold the presentation in executive session based on an interpretation of the open meeting law offered by Paul Guiliani, an attorney with Primmer Piper Eggleston and Cramer.
While the mayor said he sought the advice of legal counsel at the Vermont League of Cities and Towns and the Vermont Secretary of State’s office, neither group returned his calls.
Vermont’s open meeting law says that an executive session may only be called when a municipal body is discussing contracts, labor relations, real estate options, employment appointments, disciplinary actions or an imminent peril to public safety.
An executive session is typically focused on a narrow topic and is held only with members of a municipal body present.
Attendees at the meeting Thursday night included members of the Barre Partnership, a group of business people, and five employees of the Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development, including the commissioner, Katie Buckley, and Joan Goldstein, the commissioner of the Vermont Department of Economic Development.
Lauzon told the Times Argus last week that he wasn’t doing anything but asking the City Council and local leaders to think about the development.
The Barre mayor needs the backing of the City Council to pursue the project. The state’s role in the project is unclear at this point.
Lauzon has formed a development company, Park Center LLC, to secure options for the project, which includes a hotel and a downtown grocery store.
Four North Main Street properties would be affected, according to the Times Argus. Several vacant storefronts and the current location of the Family Dollar would be razed. The three-story Worthen Block would remain intact.
