[M]ayor Miro Weinberger announced Wednesday morning that he will not support a Burlington City Council resolution calling for an alternative mission to the F-35 fighter jets, which are slated to be based at the local airport in 2019.
Weinberger consulted with the Vermont Air National Guard and federal officials who he says satisfactorily addressed noise and public safety concerns raised by the public and a series of investigative stories by VTDigger.
Burlington voters on Town Meeting Day rejected the basing of the fighter jets at Burlington International Airport and asked that city leaders urge the Air Force to give the Vermont Air National Guard an alternative mission.
A City Council resolution passed on March 26 reflected the will of city voters.
Weinberger will not sign the resolution. While the mayor previously said he would reconsider his backing of the F-35 basing if voters opposed the fighter jets, he is now reiterating his support for the planes.
It’s the first time the mayor has not signed off on a City Council resolution.
“As I committed prior to the Town Meeting Day vote, I have looked anew at the specific concerns raised in recent months by the public and the media about the F-35 basing, and carefully considered the council’s vote,” Weinberger said in a statement. “After completing this review, I continue to strongly support the basing of the F-35s at Burlington International Airport and have concluded that I cannot responsibly approve the council resolution.”
Vetoing the resolution would merely “extend the divisive debate at the city council indefinitely,” Weinberger said in a press release.
In a commentary published by VTDigger on Wednesday, Weinberger said while the F-35s will be louder than some F-16s, the fighter jets now based at the Burlington airport, the impact will be “comparable to current and historic sound impacts.”
“The F-35 noise impacts are expected to change the current sound characteristics modestly and inconsistently,” Weinberger wrote.
An investigative report by VTDigger based on documents from the Air Force, shows that federal officials have said the F-35s will be four times louder than the F-16s and will affect 7,000 residents in Chittenden County.
In addition, the mayor said he would put an end to a home removal program near the airport. Instead, the city will offer assistance with insulation, air conditioning and “other improvements” designed to mitigate sound impacts from the F-35s.
The city has purchased 200 homes for tear-down near Burlington International Airport, with the final batch of about 20 to be razed by sometime in 2019. Weinberger says he never liked the demolition program and says he will do everything he can to bring it to a halt.
Weinberger also says federal officials have assured him that the F-35s “will not create a significant crash risk” because the planes have been adequately tested.
A VTDigger report showed that the F-35 fighter jets have been plagued by problems for many years. When the first F-16s arrived in Burlington in 1986, the plane had been rigorously tested and tweaked over the course of more than 1 million flight hours. The F-35, on the other hand, is estimated to arrive in Burlington with less than a fifth of the hours recorded by the F-16, largely because of the technical problems that have halted flights over the years.
Finally, the mayor says the Vermont Air National Guard’s F-35 mission is “important for the region’s economy.” The guard employs about 1,100 people, he says and he points to the Plattsburgh, New York, base, which has languished because of “an adverse Air Force basing decision.”
Weinberger says it would be “irresponsible” to take the risk that the Air Force would abandon the region.
In other states and cities, leaders have successfully requested a change to the Air Force mission for local air bases.
