News city council needs to build on past successes

Congratulations to all six candidates who summoned the courage and commitment to run for the three open seats on city council. Campaigning for public office can be grueling, and the continual public scrutiny keeps most of us away from that process.

Elizabeth Fitzgerald, Mike Scanlon and Laurie Smith won their races and will now join Tim Barritt, the new chair, and Andrew Chalnick, vice-chair.

Under the leadership of Helene Riehle, previous councils accomplished a great deal for the good of South Burlington and set the stage for building on those initiatives. The list of successes is impressive, highlighted by a new city hall and library complex, City Center and Market Street housing developments, a climate action plan, land development regulations, the enhancement of Transfer Development Rights, carbon-free primary heating in all new construction, required photovoltaic systems in new commercial buildings, protected habitat blocks and wider riparian areas, Conservation Planned Unit Developments, bringing BETA Technologies and attracting more small businesses to the city, and working to improve the city’s relationship with the airport, including noise mitigation for the Chamberlin neighborhood, as well as a long-term, fair tax agreement with Burlington.

Today the council needs to figure out how to revitalize the commercial spaces near City Center, especially along Dorset Street. They also need to promote both more affordable apartments for lower-income individuals and families, and at the same time advocate for more high-end apartment buildings in City Center for seniors currently living in single-family homes who would like to downsize, freeing up their homes for young families.

In addition, developing a village green in City Center will be an essential feature for a vibrant and livable city. These initiatives need to be part of a growth management plan that promotes City Center housing of all types and discourages sprawling, car-centric subdivisions miles from municipal services.

South Burlington should be Vermont’s shining model of smart growth, and not an overdeveloped and sprawling housing hub for Chittenden County.

The new council needs to use the adopted and revised city plan, not just as an advisory or aspirational document, but also as a clear guide toward a sustainable economic, social and environmental future. The plan needs to be a firm point of reference for the council to use when adopting policies and practices to address smart-growth housing and carrying costs to incentivize businesses to locate along the Williston Road and Route 7 corridors, and to preserve remaining natural lands to help mitigate the climate crisis and to provide a calming, spiritual impact that reminds us why we moved here and enjoy life in Vermont.

The council needs to complete the conservation easements on Hubbard and Wheeler parks, adopt an ordinance to phase-out small gas engines used in leaf blowers, hedge trimmers and string trimmers, encourage the use of electric lawn mowers and approve a tree preservation ordinance when it is presented by the planning commission.

The council should also set requirements for all new buildings to install electric vehicle-ready parking spaces.

The council needs to promote additional environmental imperatives for the weatherization and efficiency of rental buildings, and for regulations that require end-of- life, fossil-fuel heating and cooling systems to be replaced with carbon-free equipment wherever reasonably possible. We need an enhanced nuisance ordinance to include objective decibel-based noise standards, and we need to harmonize the noise standards to our land use regulations.

We desperately need an herbicide and pesticide policy to ensure our drinking water is clean and streams are unpolluted when they drain into Lake Champlain.

More than ever, this new council needs to focus on community outreach by occasionally meeting with residents, possibly at school facilities. They should coordinate the development of the parks and recreation, bike and pedestrian and active transportation plans to ensure effective integration between these three plans and be sure they fall into alignment with the city’s master plan.

Many of these new challenges will require the council to address multiple areas of need. None of these initiatives should be competing interests. The challenges addressed from previous councils were well managed and used the guidance of broad municipal planning documents.

That should continue.

I have full confidence that under the leadership of this new council, we will rise to the challenge and continue to plan for economic growth in designated commercial enterprise zones, for smart growth housing in a well-defined city core, and for protecting remaining open space and natural lands.

John Bossange is on the board of the South Burlington Land Trust, serves on the city’s natural resource and conservation committee, and represents South Burlington at the Champlain Valley Conservation Partnership.