Ward 5 NPA

Neighborhood Planning Assembly Minutes Ward NPA: 5 Date of Assembly : 4/16/26 Start Time: (Commence): 7:03pm Location: 645 Pine Street Finish Time: (Adjourn): 8:34pm Note taker: Jak Tiano Please forward these official minutes to: BT Steering Committee Members in Attendance:​ Prim VanWolvelear (Facilitator), Jason Van Dreische, Jak Tiano, FaRied Munarsyah, Lena Greenberg Discussion Topics Actions Taken / Decisions Made ●​ NPA Steering Committee Election ●​ Ward 5 Steering Committee Election ●​ Legislative update Agenda Items and Actions: ●​ Commence: 7:03pm ○​ Steering committee from both wards introduces themselves ○​ Prim opens the meeting and lays the ground rules for the NPA ●​ Steering Committee Election ○​ Prim announces NPA elections ○​ Jason gives a pitch to join, then Lena gives their pitch, then Jak, then Prim, then FaRied ○​ Attendees asked some questions about what we’ve accomplished, and steering committee members gave some answers; Calahan Park path, Bylaw update, Neighborhood Doing Assembly, issues-focused meetings ○​ David Foss nominates Gary Myers. Someone nominates Laura O’Malley. ○​ Slate is: ■​ Gary Myers ■​ Laura O’Malley ■​ FaRied Munarsyah ○​ All in favor ●​ Public forum ○​ City staff announced the PlanBTV 2050 open house on April 30th at One Main Street (Main Street Landing) by the Amtrak Station. Activity oriented. ○​ David Foss announces a housing summit from 2-6:30 at the Unitarian Church at the top of Church Street. ○​ Scott Lowe, ward 5 resident, representative on CDBG board, and he is making a formal announcement that he is running for Mayor in 2027. Is soliciting signatures for his petition for candidacy. ○​ Jack Evans from Local Motion says that there will be bike repair days at Zero Gravity 4-8PM, 4/28, 5/20, 6/18. Also plugs the PlanBTV 2050 open house. ○​ Stu from Walk 2 Shop gives an update on his work.  ○​ Andy Simon announces on behalf of friends of the barge canal, is having their 5th annual green up day of barge canal on 5/2, rain or shine, bring sturdy shoes, work gloves, and there will be cream cheese and bagels. Right across from Dealer.com building. ●​ Legislative update ○​ Thomas Chittenden gives a legislative update ○​ He serves on the Senate Housing, General, and Economic Affairs committee ■​ Working on vaping, tobacco, and alcohol bills. ■​ Also working on a ticket resale bill. ■​ Mileage based usage fee in the Transportation bill. ■​ We have major crises in the healthcare sector, and Sen Lyons usually speaks to that. ○​ Senate Finance is looking at two big bills: ■​ “Yield bill” is the calculation for property tax rates, and how we “buy down” the property tax increase. ○​ Gives an update on Act 181, about the way it impacted rural vermonters. ○​ Tiff chimes in about the ed bill that just passed the floor. The redistricting task force showed that forced consolidation was unsuccessful, and didn’t save much money in other places, but that voluntary mergers or cooperative agreements do demonstrate savings. ○​ Bram says education spending has gone up, quality has gone down, and opportunity is unequal. He also says that consolidation does help at the classroom level. He outlines how complicated our education funding system is, and that other state’s funding systems make more sense. He says Tiff and Bram both voted against the last bill that forced mergers, but for today’s bill that didn’t. ○​ Laura asks what else the task force said was good other than not forced mergers? ■​ Bram says the law said they had to do forced mergers, and the task force disputed that, so they actually changed the rule. ■​ Thomas also adds that the task force said pointing school construction aid to high schools, because people are worried about elementary schools, but we should keep young kids close to home but consolidate high schools that could draw a critical mass. The other thing about the senate, he says he likes the house bill, he didn’t vote for Act 73, but he doesn’t support eliminating local decisions from school budgets. It seems like the house and senate may have a path forward? ○​ Tiff says the Governor may veto the budget, but we’re not sure. ○​ Resident asks about plug-in solar connectors, for window/balcony solar. ■​ Thomas says they passed it out of the Senate, and is in Bram’s committee now. ■​ Bram says it’s great, Germany has a bunch, Utah and Virginia have passed laws, but they got a lot of testimony that was against it. ■​ CPACE is a program for solar panels. ○​ Dale asks Senator Chittenden about how cannabis is impacting Vermonters? ■​ He says he’s seen concerning numbers that THC gummies are getting into the hands of kids, and that it worries him.  ○​ Jason asks about an effort to raise taxes on high earners to recoup some of the tax break at the federal level. What happened to that? ■​ Tiff says that the amendment needed a hearing, and it didn’t have it. She says it will be hotly debated and she believes in it, and has received a lot of support on this. ■​ Thomas explains the nuances of additional taxes on people with high incomes. ●​ Adjourn: 8:34pm