BURLINGTON — Representatives of Brookfield Asset Management appeared at Monday’s City Council meeting with no new information on the stalled CityPlace Burlington project, upsetting councilors who wanted to hear progress on the project.
Aanen Olsen, a vice president for the global real estate and equity company, said Brookfield was committed to CityPlace said he could not share more details due to pending litigation and the complexity of the project.
In July, Brookfield representatives said more information would be provided this month about the redesign of the $220 million, 230,000 square foot downtown office, housing and retail space.
That didn’t happen at the Burlington City Council meeting Monday night.
Olsen’s statement led to consternation and a flurry of comments and questions from councilors. Republican council President Kurt Wright demanded to know if the brief update was all Brookfield had to say about ongoing delays.
More than a year ago, the developer left a gaping, block-sized hole in the center of the city.
“I think people were hoping for a lot more, to start with,” Wright said.
Monday’s council appearance was Brookfield’s first since the company’s announcement in July that the development would be redesigned, which would cause additional delays. At the time, Mayor Miro Weinberger said Brookfield’s redesign would likely address some of the criticisms of the size and scale of the project.
Asked for a general timeline and in response to a question from Wright, Olsen said that there could be construction activity in the next year.
“It’s certainly not going to be 10 years, or even four,” Olsen said. “With phasing of the project you can anticipate seeing some action in the near term, in the next year. We’re here to push this project forward, and that’s what we’re going to do.”
Progressive Councilor Max Tracy said that the public’s trust has been violated by Brookfield’s failure to follow through, and said the “non-update update” was not acceptable. Tracy said he believed Brookfield has violated the development agreement with the city.
“The time for playing nice has long since passed, and I would encourage us to take a much harder line with the developer,” Tracy said.
Public records obtained by VTDigger show the city had taken another look at the development agreement this summer, with an attorney preparing a “default analysis” and “noncompliance list.”
Weinberger said the city is in talks with Brookfield about the company taking more responsibility for city administrative costs caused by the delays.
“Clearly Brookfield is not fully in compliance with the development agreement, but we think the best course of action forward for the city of Burlington, the most direct way forward to a good outcome on the site, is continuing to work with them,” Weinberger said.
The site in the heart of Burlington’s downtown has sat vacant for a year since the conclusion of the mall demolition in August 2018 as planned construction start dates have come and gone without action.
The development was initially planned as a 14-story, $220 million project, which would feature retail, office and housing space. The city has planned to spend $22 million in tax increment financing on infrastructure improvements alongside the project, most prominently reconnecting Pine and St. Paul streets.
Jeff Glassberg, the consultant working on the project for the city, told the council that he has pressed Brookfield to share more information about its plans.
For the rest of this year, Glassberg said, the city will work with Brookfield to restore the public rights of way around the stalled development site and will coordinate with Burlington City Arts to decorate the barriers around the project.
Brookfield is also working with the leading tenant for the office space, the University of Vermont Medical Center, to ensure the hospital remains committed, Glassberg said.
Glassberg said he will seek guidance from the City Council in the future about necessary amendments to the development agreement which would update the schedule and milestones around the project.
Brookfield is the majority partner in the development, and has taken complete control of the project from developer Don Sinex, the minority partner, Weinberger said in July.
When Brookfield announced the redesign in July, Weinberger said developer should provide an update “as soon as possible” and include illustrations of project changes, a general timeline and plans to minimize public impacts during construction.
Weinberger said Brookfield was working on minimizing those public impacts, and while he was frustrated Brookfield did not share more information on the project changes and timeline, he was optimistic “promising information” would be shared soon.
Olsen said that Will Voegele, who had been Brookfield’s face of the project, had taken a position at another company and is no longer involved in the project. Olsen was joined Monday by Joginder Singh and Chelsea Ziegelbaum, the only one of the three who had previously appeared before the council.
Independent Councilor Sharon Bushor said that the new faces from Brookfield made her feel like the CityPlace project was “a project nobody wants, and it keeps getting passed on to new people.”
“There has to be something to share so that people know you actually are meeting and actually have this project on the agenda,” Bushor said.
Brookfield had not considered selling the property, Olsen said in response to a question from Progressive Councilor Ali Dieng.
Olsen said one of the first tasks Brookfield is working on is resolving a lawsuit filed by attorney John Franco on behalf of project opponents, which accuses the developers of violating the terms of the settlement agreement with project opponents by changing the amount of parking.
Olsen said the project was not on hold because of the lawsuit, but the active litigation is an obstacle needed to be overcome.
The public forum featured a handful of residents who said the City Council should have done more to hold Brookfield accountable.
Resident Caryn Long said that decisions made by the council contributed to the creation of the “CityHole” on the site.
“It was not an act of God or a natural disaster, it cannot be blamed on Trump,” Long said. “It was made by decisions here to fail to hold the developer to account.”
