Dear Gov. Phil Scott,
I rode into my office in Burlington in late August, enjoying the new bike paths along the Champlain Parkway and Pine Street along the way. Church Street was alive with the return of students, and the waterfront was similarly vibrant with walkers, bikers and people out enjoying the glory days of late summer.
I noticed that the new Burlington Square building was looking great, and the painfully slow infrastructure improvements along Main Street and beyond were likewise starting to reveal their final form.
Also evident in my midday walk through City Hall Park were the well-documented substance use and homelessness issues facing Burlington. These were issues that you discussed briefly in your Aug. 20 press conference, resulting in some “he said-she said” back and forth press with Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak. If I could summarize your comments during your conference, they were that your administration was certainly willing to help but that you were in effect waiting for the phone to ring.
During your conference, you also took issue with the characterization of Burlington as the “economic engine” of the state. To that I respectfully disagree.
Chittenden County — with Burlington as our epicenter — represents 26% of Vermont’s population but generates 37% of Vermont’s gross domestic product and 35% of its income taxes. Vermonters likewise continue to vote with their feet — 61% of Vermont’s population growth since the year 2000 went Chittenden County — presumably drawn to higher-paying jobs, a vibrant civic life and other opportunities.
The future of our state is inextricably linked to the future of its largest city.
Scott, I’ll note that I have voted for you on multiple occasions, but if there’s been a critique of your leadership, I have too often heard it’s that you show up long enough to veto the bill without sufficient engagement in crafting it along the way. Whether that’s fair or not, Burlington — and Vermont, by extension — needs your more active involvement to address challenges that fall disproportionately on Burlington that are not the fault of city policy.
Whatever policy differences I might have with Burlington Progressives — and there are many — I don’t believe they convinced the Sackler family to get a generation of Americans hooked on opioids. I don’t think they caused the nationwide housing shortage and resulting homelessness epidemic. I don’t think they contributed to our insufficient mental health support system, among other issues.
While the Burlington City Council has belatedly responded to community requests for increased enforcement — especially in City Hall Park — fixing the city’s problems is going to require your administration’s active engagement and in building solutions well beyond recommendations for more enforcement.
What are opportunities for increased administration involvement? Let’s start with proactive outreach to Mulvaney-Stanak — along with city leaders suffering similar issues in Rutland, Brattleboro and beyond.
This would help to not only to coordinate statewide policy solutions, but also to increase Vermont State Police’s focus on combatting drug trafficking throughout the state, propose a viable replacement to the motel program, address judiciary and prosecutor shortages, move the police academy to Chittenden County where a majority of recent graduates can more easily attend, or implement similar measures to reduce our policing shortages, among a range of other items.
Most importantly, however, simply showing up to demonstrate your renewed commitment to supporting the — yes — economic engine of Vermont through your words and actions.
For many years Chittenden County tax dollars have disproportionately subsidized small schools and provided policing in rural parts of the state, disproportionately funded health care and housing for needy Vermonters, and likewise disproportionately helped with road-building and recovery efforts when the floodwaters rise in Burke, Barre, Ludlow and beyond.
Well, the floodwaters have risen in Burlington with the trifecta of housing shortages, a national opioid crisis and inadequate mental health services, and Vermont needs your active leadership to help solve it.
For the good of our state, please step it up.
Matt Wormser, vice chair of the Shelburne Selectboard
Shelburne
