BURLINGTON — The City Council approved a development agreement during a special meeting Tuesday night allowing construction to begin on the long-stalled CityPlace project.
The new agreement permits a phased approach to construction, speeding up the process and allowing the first phase — the pouring of concrete — to begin as soon as next week.
“This is a historic and exciting moment for our city,” Council President Karen Paul, D-Ward 6, said following the unanimous vote.
The council voted to accept a new version of the agreement to replace the original, which was adopted between the city and development’s previous owner, Don Sinex. His stake in the project was bought out this year by a new group called CityPlace Partners, which has worked to revive the ambitious construction project in downtown Burlington.
CityPlace Partners includes Farrington Construction owner Dave Farrington, Omega Electrical Construction Co. owner Al Senecal and S.D. Ireland Construction owner and president Scott Ireland. All were present at the council meeting on Tuesday.
“We’re raring to go and ready to get started on this project,” Farrington said.
Mayor Miro Weinberger publicly thanked the partners at the meeting, saying he “can’t think of a better partner for the city to move forward.”
“We’re on the cusp of achieving a major milestone that we’ve been working towards for a long time,” Weinberger said in remarks to the council.
Prior to the vote, which took place with one absence from Perri Freeman, P-Central District, many councilors took turns thanking and congratulating the administration and developers for reviving the project.
Councilor Ben Traverse, D-Ward 5, said he considered it a “good problem” that many people want to be in Burlington, but one that has made the city less affordable as rents have skyrocketed in an ever-tighter housing market.
“One of the primary ways we can address it is welcoming a whole lot more housing — especially affordable housing — to this community, so I’m grateful that we can go back to our communities and our constituents now and say, ‘We are closer now than at any point in recent memory to putting shovels in the ground,’” Traverse said.
Though all councilors who spoke were enthusiastic about moving forward, Ali Dieng, I-Ward 7, expressed some nervousness along with his support for the project.
“My only fear is moving from the pit to the podium,” Dieng said, employing the term that developers used for the foundation. “But I do not want us to go forward and then for this podium to become the new pit.”
The podium will consist of a common garage space and first floor of the structure, according to project attorney Tim Sampson of the law firm Downs Rachlin Martin.
The new development agreement is 114 pages and functions as a contract between developers and the city. Developers plan to construct new buildings with retail spaces and residential units and to link disconnected sections of Saint Paul and Pine streets.
Accompanying the proposed agreement on the council agenda was a memo from Sampson. He outlined the major changes from the earlier agreement at Tuesday’s meeting.
According to the memo, the first change allows for construction to begin. The previous agreement stated that all financing must be secured for any construction to start. The new agreement amends that to allow the new developers to begin work on the “podium” phase of the building even as they finalize funding sources and construction contracts.
Allowing construction to take place with such a phased approach, Sampson said, could allow concrete construction to begin as soon as the second week of November.
Also changed under the new agreement are deadlines related to tax increment financing, a public-private partnership to finance infrastructure projects and development. The state of Vermont extended deadlines related to the TIF program, so the new agreement had to reflect that, Sampson said.
The new agreement also allows for changes to allow for Champlain Housing Trust to proceed with a plan to build 85 units of affordable housing as part of the project. Sampson said during the meeting that language was added in the agreement to give the city room to adjust its affordable housing ordinance “if it’s needed to help the Champlain Housing Trust component proceed,” he said.
Champlain Housing CEO Michael Monte said earlier in the meeting that he was confident that the affordable units would meet the city’s requirements.
The final change listed in the updated agreement was prompted by the city, Sampson said. It states that the city is currently pursuing up to $15 million in federal grants, which, if awarded, could be an “alternative source of funding for the public improvements to streets and sidewalks in and around the project.”
