Tuesday, May 28, 2019
At a press conference Tuesday, the mayor announced his appointment of Lukas McGowan to run CEDO, the city department that oversees everything from a lead abatement program to housing policies and the city’s tax-increment financing districts.
McGowan, who currently lives in South Woodstock, worked as a regional field director for then-presidential candidate Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign and later as vice president Joe Biden’s speechwriter. McGowan also served in the White House Office of Legislative Affairs, according to his résumé. He earned degrees from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and from Columbia University.
McGowan left government in 2012 and went on to help run a San Francisco tech startup called Thumbtack, which connects consumers with services such as plumbers, photographers and other small businesses and sole proprietors, he said. The company started with 10 employees and grew to 400, Weinberger added.
McGowan’s wide-ranging experience in both the public and private sectors make him well suited for the job, the mayor said.
Tags: Burlington , Lukas McGowan , Community Economic Development Office , Miro Weinberger , Web Only , Image
Monday, May 27, 2019
Burlington parent Rebecca Mack filed a complaint with GMT about the May 23 incident that reportedly began with students of color singing and clapping on the bus ride home, Mack wrote in a widely shared Facebook post.
The students, two of whom are Mack’s children, attend Edmunds Elementary and Middle Schools. The Burlington School District contracts with the local bus company for student transportation.
Mack was at Barrio Bakery on North Winooski Avenue around 3 p.m. that day when she saw a group of kids, ranging in age from 5 to 13 years old and all students of color, walking together on the street. They told her that the bus driver made them get off on North Street and asked Mack to record a video while they recounted the incident.
"They were very upset, and they were certain they were targeted on the basis of their skin color," Mack told Seven Days on Monday. "I can say for my own children, this was the most personally racist event that had ever happened to them, and it’s something that’s never going to go away."
Tags: Burlington , Green Mountain Transit , Edmunds Middle School , Edmunds Elementary School , Rebecca Mack , Ali Dieng , Max Tracy , Kurt Wright , Miro Weinberger , mayor , city council , bus , racism , Web Only , Image
Tuesday, May 21, 2019
Wayne Brunette was holding a long-handled shovel when former Burlington cop Ethan Thibault shot and killed the mentally disturbed man outside of his parents' Randy Lane home. Brunette's wife, Barbara, filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit in 2015.
The court cleared Thibault and another responding officer, Brent Navari, of wrongdoing but maintained that the city “failed to reasonably accommodate Mr. Brunette’s mental disability,” according to a police department press release issued Tuesday. The case was headed for trial this fall, but the city agreed to the settlement during mediation in April "without an admission of liability," the release said.
Tags: Burlington Police Department , Wayne Brunette , Douglas Kilburn , Brandon del Pozo , T.J. Donovan , use of force , Web Only , Image
Monday, May 20, 2019
It will have showers, public bathrooms, and a store, and will add boat slips to a waterfront where they are in short supply. The facility will entice more of the boaters who visit the area to stick around, said Burlington Harbor Marina co-owner and codeveloper Jack Wallace.
"There's a lot of boaters from Canada that cruise the lake," Wallace said at the site on Friday, as a crane lifted sections of floating dock into place.
The Lake Champlain marina is near the U.S. Coast Guard Station and the Burlington fishing pier. About 60 slips will be available for "transient" boaters who want to drop by for a day or a weekend. Of the remaining 100 slips, about 70 are booked for the season, which will run roughly from mid-May to mid-October.
Tags: Burlington Harbor Marina , Burlington , Lake Champlain , boating , Web Only , Image
The Burlington Department of Public Works is asking the Board of Finance and City Council to approve “Cooperative Agreement Amendment No. 7,” which would cement a spending plan between the city and state for the two-lane, 2.8-mile, multimodal link between Interstate 189 and downtown Burlington.
Public Works Director Chapin Spencer submitted an update for Monday night's council meeting, but members will discuss the plan in detail on June 3, he said. The original cooperative agreement was penned in 1998, Spencer said.
“The fact that this amendment will secure funds for the final design, bidding and construction phases of the project is a key milestone, as it will bring this project through to construction,” he said.
Tags: Burlington , Champlain Parkway , transportation , Chapin Spencer , Web Only , Image
Friday, May 17, 2019
"I don’t anticipate homes being removed," airport aviation director Gene Richards told Seven Days Wednesday.
The map will be released to the public during an airport open house from 5 to 7 p.m. on May 29. The City of Winooski will host its own open house the following day from 5 to 7 p.m. at the O'Brien Community Center.
Richards declined to release a copy of the noise map Wednesday, saying it was still in draft form. Seven Days has filed a public records request for the document.
Tags: F-35 , Burlington , South Burlington , Burlington International Airport , jet noise , Chamberlin School , Gene Richards , Nic Longo , Web Only , Image
Wednesday, May 15, 2019
Stacey Trudo, Dawn Monahan and Abigail Tykocki, all former senior-level BT employees, filed the lawsuit in March in Franklin County Superior Court against the City of Burlington, BT general manager Stephen Barraclough and his supervisor, William Dorman, who goes by Terry.
Through their attorney, Thomas Nuovo of Bauer Gravel Farnham, the women say they were denied equal pay for equal work and were assigned extra duties without additional compensation, despite the fact that male employees were awarded raises and bonuses.
They’re asking for a jury trial, attorney fees, and for damages related to violations of state and federal fair compensation laws, and emotional distress, the complaint says. The city’s response denies the allegations and says “any differences in wage were due to bona fide factors other than sex.”
Tags: Burlington Telecom , Stephen Barraclough , Burlington , Miro Weinberger , Joan Shannon , Pietro Lynn , lawsuit , #MeToo , Terry Dorman , Abigail Tykocki , Stacey Trudo , Dawn Monahan , Web Only , Image
Tuesday, May 14, 2019
For more than two hours, councilors took turns asking del Pozo about issues surrounding the recently released footage, which captures officers knocking two black men unconscious in separate incidents last fall.
Those cases are the subject of two lawsuits recently filed in federal court, claiming excessive use of force. Since media reports broke about the Jérémie Meli and Mabior Jok cases, Black Lives Matter of Greater Burlington has issued a list of demands, including that Burlington police fire the officers involved.
Inside a packed Burlington City Hall Auditorium on Monday, Councilor Ali Dieng (D/P-Ward 7) said the incidents are indicative of a problem with leadership. He told del Pozo it was embarrassing to learn about the Meli and Jok cases from the media eight months after the fact.
Tags: Burlington City Council , Burlington Police , Vermont , police brutality , excessive force , Black Lives Matter of Greater Burlington , Brandon del Pozo , Web Only , Image
Friday, May 10, 2019
The secret ballot to join the American Federation of Teachers, Vermont union passed 43-41 among physicians, registered nurses, social workers and others at the centers' eight regional practices, according to an emailed statement from AFT-Vermont.
However, a second group of so-called "nonprofessional" staff — medical assistants and health care support staff — defeated the unionization effort by a vote of 47-32. But organizers of the effort alleged the administration unfairly impacted the election process.
Tags: Community Health Centers of Burlington , union , health care , Megan Cronkite , Andrea Solomon , Kim Anderson , NLRB , Web Only , Image
Thursday, May 9, 2019
More than 60 people gathered at the First Unitarian Universalist Society Meeting House on Thursday night to call for accountability and action from Burlington police and city councilors following recent allegations of police brutality.
Organized by Montpelier-based advocacy group Justice for All and Black Lives Matter of Greater Burlington, the “emergency community meeting” came in response to the recent release of body camera footage showing Sgt. Jason Bellavance and Officer Joseph Corrow knocking two young black men unconscious in separate incidents last fall.
Tags: Burlington Police Department , Douglas Kilburn , police , Web Only , Image