Friday, September 30, 2016
Not so, says city attorney Eileen Blackwood.
Burlington has already mailed out the state ballot, which includes candidates for president, statewide office and statehouse seats, because state law requires that those ballots be sent out no later than 45 days before the November 8 election.
The deadline for local-issue ballots isn’t until October 19 — so they’ll be sent out separately. Even if the council weren’t deliberating into late September, Blackwood said the city wouldn’t be able to get its ballots out much earlier than the deadline because it would reduce the time available for petitioners trying to get questions on the ballot.
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Thursday, September 29, 2016
But the council will also let voters have the final say, as they decided to put the question on the November ballot — a move backed by Mayor Miro Weinberger. The decision appeared to be preemptive. Opponents of the project were planning to collect signatures for a petition that would spur a citywide vote.
In the new district, the maximum building height would increase from 105 feet to 160 feet. New developments would also be subject to higher environmental and architectural standards.
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A combination of fewer college-age students and rising costs drove Vermont State Colleges Chancellor Jeb Spaulding to propose it.
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Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) joined 25 of his peers in opposing the stopgap spending bill, which nevertheless passed the Senate with 72 votes in favor. The veteran Democrat pledged last week to vote against the so-called continuing resolution if it did not include reforms to the EB-5 immigrant investor visa program. Instead, the legislation simply extended it, as written, until December.
According to Leahy spokesman David Carle, his "nay" vote was "a direct result" of his reservations on EB-5.
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The Republican candidate’s decision fulfilled one of the two options that would resolve any perceived conflict of interest over state contracts DuBois Construction bids on, said Christina Amestoy, the party’s spokeswoman.
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Sue Minter seemed to agree. “I’m awfully glad he’s finally recognized there is a conflict of interest,” she said Monday at an unrelated press conference.
Since then, however, Minter has moved the goal posts, urging more stringent standards for what counts as conflict of interest.
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Wednesday, September 28, 2016
"If I learn from the independent assessment that the legislature funded that there is a way to move, I will move," Minter said, referring to a $250,000 study due to lawmakers in December. "If I learn that there's a way to complete and make the system functional, I will do that."
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Shumlin rode the Cessna 182 to or from public events three times in September, according to spokeswoman Sue Allen. He was scheduled to take a fourth trip last Friday, as WCAX-TV first reported, but it was canceled due to inclement weather.
The governor, who moved in August from East Montpelier back to his hometown of Putney, used the plane just four times in the year prior to his relocation.
At an unrelated press conference Wednesday, Shumlin defended his frequent flier status. He said that taking the plane from Hartness State Airport in nearby Springfield saves his Vermont State Police detail from having to make the 220-mile roundtrip from Montpelier to Putney to pick him up and drop him off. But he conceded that the plane has its limitations.
"It can only fly when it's blue sky," the governor said. "It can't fly at night."
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Several major Burlington institutions are backing a plan to create a district heat system that would harness waste heat from the Joseph C. McNeil Generating Station.
A group of residents has been trying for decades to convince city leaders to implement this type of system, which works like an electric grid — but for heat. The idea has been formally studied at least six times, with the most recent report concluding that it didn't make financial sense.
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Doctors, hospitals and consumers have three weeks to weigh in on the plan before the state’s Green Mountain Care Board signs off on it.
“It’s complicated,” Shumlin acknowledged of the plan, after his staff handed out piles of paperwork detailing the draft five-year agreement that’s been in the works for two years. Nonetheless, Green Mountain Care Board chair Al Gobeille said health care providers should be able to readily determine what they think about the plan.
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He will ask the city council Thursday to approve the change, and to also put the zoning question on the November 8 ballot for voters to decide.
Weinberger is a staunch supporter of the height increase, which would allow
buildings up to 14 stories tall at the site of the proposed $250 million Burlington Town Center redevelopment. The current height limit is about ten stories.
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