Burlington City Councilor Franklin Paulino is not running for reelection in the city’s North District.
He’s endorsing a new Democratic face to take his spot — Kerin Durfee, who’s on the Burlington Police Commission, which is a citizen oversight group, and is the director of earned revenue and guest services at ECHO, the Leahy Center for Lake Champlain.
Paulino, a Democrat, said he’s sitting out this race to focus on his family and achieve a better work-life balance. Paulino said he has three young kids who need his full support going to virtual school.
“Covid has really changed things for me as a parent,” he said. “You’re not just a parent anymore. You’re part schoolteacher, part parent.”
Paulino said he thinks he’s achieved what he set out to do on the council — establish reasonable policies that can appeal to both Democrats and Republicans in his district, which is known to have a conservative tilt.
Specifically, he’s excited that his proposal to add full-time social workers to the Burlington Police Department is moving forward. Mayor Miro Weinberger is endorsing the idea and has a plan to allocate funding for two new positions.
Although he’s taking a break from Burlington politics, Paulino said he might return in the future. As for running for mayor? “Hard no,” Paulino said.
He said there are people champing at the bit to run for City Council in his district, so he expects a competitive race when voters head to the polls in March. When Paulino ran in 2019, the North District was a competitive seat between Progressives and Democrats. He thinks Durfee is the best fit because she knows the Burlington community well.
“She has that mindset,” Paulino said, “about being a voice of reason and wanting to get things done.”
Durfee said she’s concerned about the divisiveness that’s emerged between Progressives and Democrats in the city. She said she’s not sure she can cure that on her own, but if elected, she wants to bring more unity to the council, specifically over issues of racial justice.
“We should be able to agree on racial justice, and then move forward. We should be able to agree on policing policy and move forward,” Durfee said. “What I’m saying is, we’re stuck.”
Durfee has been involved in the Burlington community for years, with organizations such as Women Helping Battered Women (now called Steps to End Domestic Violence), the Burlington Partnership for a Health Community, and the NAACP.
“It sounds so cliche, but I’m looking to unify. I can talk to a lot of different groups of people,” Durfee said. “As a Black woman, that certainly is a privilege. And I want to use that privilege to bring folks together.”
