Editor’s note: Ron Jacobs lives in Winooski and works in Burlington. He is an author and writer. His most recent publication is a look at the Trump presidency, titled “Truck Fump.”
Lost in the weeks of Covid shutdowns, protests and other actions against police brutality, in support of Black Lives Matter, and against layoffs and shutdowns in city government and Vermont colleges, are the open sores of Burlington’s downtown. City Hall Park remains closed because of delays related to Covid-19 and the pit that was once Burlington Square Mall festers just off of Church Street.
Although the necessity of redoing the park remains a sore point, the fact it continues to be closed is unrelated to finance. However, the lack of absolutely any progress on the mall renovations is a prime example of the role billionaires and their institutions play in destroying functioning communities.
As of this writing, one of the original investors — Sinex — is gone. The other investment company, Brookfield, continues to evade the city and reject citizen concerns. The public has not been heard from them since early winter 2020. For those who don’t know, Brookfield is a multi-billion dollar corporation with headquarters in Canada. It is the same corporation that demanded New York City police attack protesters in 2011 who had occupied Zuccotti Park as part of the Occupy Wall Street movement. Brookfield owned the property.
It is also the entity that purchased the building at 666 Fifth Ave. from Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner. Although it denies there was any “quid pro quo,” many believe the primary reason Brookfield bought the building was in the hope it would get the contract to build ill-advised nuclear reactors in Saudi Arabia via its subsidiary Westinghouse Electric. That contract is currently tied up in Congress and other government entities in Washington, D.C.
Meanwhile, the new shopping, living and office complex that was sold to the taxpayers of Burlington with a politician’s promise it would be open a year ago is just a big hole in the ground. If anyone knows the timetable for its completion, they aren’t telling. Indeed, if anyone knows if construction will ever begin again, they aren’t telling. One word to describe this situation is the word pathetic. However, that would be letting too many politicians, city officials and financiers off the hook much too easy. Not only do the people who live and work in Burlington deserve an answer to those questions, those responsible for what looks to this writer like fraud need to answer for their actions — or their inaction, if you wish.
Given the apparent failure of Sinex and Brookfield to actually build anything on the site — and the failure of the city government to get them to build anything — it seems like a good time to reconsider the space. Instead of building a lot of shops and restaurants whose commitment to the city of Burlington and its people is vastly outweighed by commitment to stockholders and company bottom lines, why not claim the land and create a community-owned and operated environment? Such a configuration could include a year-round farmer’s market, some parkland, locally-owned (both cooperatively and privately owned) shops, restaurants and bars, and a waystation for Burlington’s houseless population. It could be funded in a manner similar to the way Burlington’s waterfront was reinvented as a public park with privately-owned entities nearby. Another means of funding could be that used to fund the construction of City Market. For those who don’t recall, that cooperatively-owned grocery store was originally funded in part via a bond issue approved by the voters of Burlington. The entire amount was paid back well before it was due. This is quite different from the TIFF mechanism voters granted to SINEX a couple elections ago. In short, the latter was essentially a gift to the investors, who had no incentive to pay it back under the terms of the agreement.
If such an endeavor was undertaken, at least part of Burlington’s downtown district would truly belong to the people who live there, not some private Marketplace Commission or some giant investment entity whose decisions are determined by a financial market that has proven over and over that it cares little about Main Street or the people who live and work there.
