Monday, September 12, 2016
Rick Bove, grandson of the Italian eatery's founders, is proposing to demolish the restaurant building at 64 Pearl Street in Burlington to make way for a $14 million apartment complex. It would include two buildings, one with 39 units and another with 17 units, as well as a 60-car underground garage.
The development would add 50 net units of housing on the edge of downtown, after subtracting what would be lost in demolition. The proposal also calls for demolishing two 19th-century apartment houses around the corner, at 13 and 19 George Street.
The red brick General Stannard House on the corner of George and Pearl streets would be renovated, according to the application Bove filed with the city. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The restaurant, with its iconic 1940s art deco facade and pistachio interior, closed last December after serving up meatballs and red sauce for more than 70 years. It survived a 1960s urban renewal spree that razed much of Burlington's Little Italy. Over the decades, it served legions of hungry college kids, families and politicians.
Tags: Burlington , Bove's Café , Pearl Street , Image , Web Only
Friday, September 9, 2016
The Parks, Recreation & Waterfront Department is putting the word out on social media and Front Porch Forum. It’s asking people to use North Avenue instead — accessible by Depot Street at the southern end of the construction and Institute Road at the northern end.
Construction work won’t affect the skate park, North Beach or the Community Sailing Center.
A construction crew has been working on the $2.4 million project throughout the summer, rerouting one section of the bike path along the Urban Reserve closer to Lake Champlain and removing 1,400 tons of asphalt and concrete from the surrounding area.
Tags: Burlington Bike Path , Jesse Bridges , Image , Web Only
Wednesday, August 24, 2016
So said Libertarian presidential hopeful Gary Johnson on a campaign swing through South Burlington Wednesday night with running mate William Weld by his side.
The two former Republican governors, both converts to the Libertarian Party, wore blue jeans and relaxed expressions as they pledged to fight tax increases, simplify the tax codes and make government better by making large portions of it disappear.
"Count on us to reduce taxes every single time," Johnson said. "Count on us because we get to run the administration of the federal government, that rules and regulations are going to get better, not worse."
A few hundred people waved signs proclaiming, "Our Best America Yet. You In?" and cheered loudly at the Sheraton Burlington Hotel & Conference Center as Johnson essentially proposed to put government on a starvation diet in order to fatten the wallets of ordinary people.
Tags: cannabis related , election rally , elections 2016 , Gary Johnson , Libertarians , presidential campaign , William Weld , Image , Web Only
Friday, August 19, 2016
Officials will soon expand a needle-disposal pilot program that began at Burlington City Hall last winter, officials said.
The Parks, Recreation & Waterfront Department will outfit several bathrooms at “high public use and waterfront locations” around the city by September 1, said Deryk Roach, the superintendent of parks maintenance and operations. Officials hope the Stericycle boxes will reduce the number of used needles found in parks and on city sidewalks.
“Even one receptacle can lower the risk for maintenance workers, employees and members of the public using those facilities,” Roach told Seven Days.
Tags: needle disposal , Deryk Roach , Burlington parks , Selene Colburn , Image , Web Only
Friday, August 12, 2016
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s … really friggin’ loud!
Some Burlington residents are making noise about the loud and low passes made by military jets and aerobatic aircraft ahead of this weekend’s Wings Over Vermont air show. Both Thursday and Friday, aircraft buzzed the Burlington waterfront, getting ready for a spectacle that organizers said could draw up to 40,000 people.
But the loud practice runs prompted some concerned citizens to vent online — or call the police. Chief Brandon del Pozo said “numerous” calls about the noise had the potential to clog the dispatch switchboard and hinder the response to an actual emergency.
“Please advise the public that no number of calls to the police will alter the plans for the show or the level of noise it creates,” del Pozo said in a press release.
Tags: Burlington , Wings over Vermont , Burlington air show , Image , Web Only
Thursday, August 11, 2016
But you won’t see the Vermont Flight Academy among the list of sponsors.
The local pilot training school, based at Burlington International Airport, paid to have a table with promotional material on the waterfront during the aviation extravaganza.
“At the last minute we got notified that they said they had a contractual arrangement that prohibited us from participating in the show,” said Ed Antczak, executive director of the academy.
Tags: burlington , aviation , Image , Web Only
The 35-page decision by Judge Geoffrey Crawford, released Wednesday, removes one of the last major impediments to delivering 18 F-35s, which are larger and louder than the F-16s currently based at the airport, to the Vermont Air National Guard in 2019.
A group of Winooski and South Burlington residents, along with the city of Winooski, sued after the basing decision, arguing that the Air Force had failed to conduct a thorough review of the environmental impact of the F-35s. They asked Crawford to block the planes and order the Air Force to conduct a new review, known as an environmental impact statement (EIS).
But Crawford was not persuaded.
Tags: F-35 , Vermont Air National Guard , James Dumont , Judge Geoffrey Crawford , Image , Web Only
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
The board voted unanimously to adopt a one-year plan to improve the racial climate for district employees.
In June 2015, three African American employees complained about “outright discrimination and harassment.” They were Nikki Fuller, director of the diversity, equity and community partnership office; Henri Sparks, director of equity; and Da Verne Bell, who left the city school system earlier this year after working as diversity education director.
The three filed the complaint to the school board Diversity & Equity Committee. The full school board then agreed to hire an independent investigator to examine the claims. The report, completed this spring, found no specific instances of racially motivated conduct or retaliation, according to the school board, but it did find a culture of “pervasive racism” that needs to be addressed.
Tags: Burlington , education , race , diversity , Image , Web Only
Monday, August 8, 2016
City Attorney Eileen Blackwood said the city is still deciding whether to appeal.
Burlington filed suit last January amid a years-long struggle with Kwon. According to the code enforcement office, he has refused to address roughly 100 violations of the city’s housing code at his four apartment buildings, despite multiple fines, violation notices and follow-up visits.
Kwon has contended that the only violations he hasn't addressed have been trivial, and he's suggested that the city’s code enforcement director, Bill Ward, has a personal grudge against him. Ward denies that.
Tags: Soon Kwon , Chittenden County Superior Court , code enforcement , Bill Ward , Image , Web Only
Thursday, July 21, 2016
At a press conference held behind the derelict brick building, Weinberger told reporters he is giving the New Moran team until November 11 to prove to the city that they have an updated, financially viable proposal.
What, exactly, that entails, Weinberger couldn't say. But he reiterated his ongoing concerns — that the team lacks people with significant development experience and that they've failed to secure firm commitments from longterm tenants for the building.
Tags: Moran Plant , Miro Weinberger , New Moran , Burlington , Image , Web Only