Help Shape Burlington forward - Your Input Matters

Lisa Lax is a resident of Burlington, Vermont. She serves as an Insepctor of Elections.

This is a response to Councilor Schacter and the other city councilors (all Democrats) who introduced the Burlington Forward resolution at the August 3 City Council Meeting.

At this council meeting, there were over 100 people present in person and on line for public comment. As reported in the news, approximately two thirds of those who spoke said they opposed the Democrat city councilors' Burlington Forward resolution. Most of these folks are residents of Burlington and/or are providing services to the marginalized people that the resolution seeks to remove from downtown. Many of these folks urged the Democrat city councilors to work with Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak on shaping the policy and approaches that the Mayor and her administration have been working on for the past 2.5 years. This was a powerful statement from the public, one that members of city council would be wise to heed.

The current administration has been gathering input from many sources during the past 2.5 years, including input from research and from professional experts in the mental health, substance abuse, housing, and law enforcement fields. We have several complicated intertwining problems affecting public safety. The public safety concerns have been building for over a decade. Prior to the current administration, the city was led for a number of years by a Democrat Mayor and a Democrat majority on city council and these problems were not successfully addressed or resolved during that time. I am not blaming those who were in power before. But I do believe we need to give the Mayor and her administration the opportunity to continue their policy process rather than fight it mid-stream. The mayor was fairly elected to her post, she has considerable experience in government, and her policies just may offer some much needed change.

My view is that our city does not need another "public engagement" process separate from what the Mayor has undertaken. We need you and the other city councilors to cease the political grandstanding, and work across party lines in an earnest and meaningful way to solve complicated problems confronting our city.