Councilor neubieser’s statement on 25-26 Council president bid

My name is Carter Neubieser, I represent Ward 1 on the Burlington City Council  and I am proud to announce my intent to run for City Council President this year. If given the chance to serve in this role, I’d be laser focused on decreasing the partisanship and personal attacks and increasing the collaboration and delivering results.

Here’s how we’ll do that together:

First, we need Fair public notice of all resolutions:
No significant resolution should appear on a Council Agenda without adequate opportunity for each council caucus, the public, the media, and our Neighborhood Planning Assemblies to substantively engage with it. Dropping significant or controversial resolutions on a meeting agenda the Thursday prior to a council meeting as partisan tactic has clearly bred distrust, and produced worse policy discussions and outcomes for residents.

Second, we need Consistent & predictable public comment periods: 
Public comment should be held at the same time every council meeting, unless extraordinary circumstances prevent us from doing so. Inconsistent times for public comment has decreased, rather than increased participation from residents.

Third, we must increase Bi-partisanship through our Council Committee’s
We see bi-partisan resolutions with thoughtful compromise emerge out of committees all the time. Let's make moving resolutions appropriately through our council’s committee structures standard practice.

Additionally, some committee assignments are more time intensive or hold more power than others. The Charter Change and Ordinance committee’s should be 4 member committees made up of 2 members from each caucus. This approach would force bi-partisan collaboration and compromise.

Fourth, We must Tone down the personal attacks & increase the collaboration:  
The Council President must rigorously manage public comment and council discussion to stop personal attacks including overtly bigoted statements of any kind, while protecting Free Speech and the ability of the public and councilors to participate in the democratic process. The Position of Council President should be collaborative, non-partisan, and objective. This includes encouraging all members to  listen to, and work with each other, regardless of party affiliation, through such steps as information sharing, Council agenda preparation, speaking time allocation, and other measures.

Finally, we need a greater Respect for City Staff : 
Agenda items requiring city staff to attend council meetings after their normal working hours should be prioritized to ensure staff get home to their families at a reasonable hour. Let’s avoid staff sitting in city hall until late into the night whenever possible.

Let me conclude my remarks by sharing why I felt compelled to seek this role right now. The reality is, the vast majority of Burlingtonians cannot afford to buy a home and struggle to afford rent. The median sale price of a home in Burlington is over half a million dollars. 60% of residents rent, of those people 31% pay more than half of their income on rent and face a rental market with a 1.5% vacancy rate.

Algae blooms in Lake Champlain are worsening, harming both recreation and tourism in town; Smoke from wildfires increasingly affects our ability to breath clean air; more unpredictable weather and extreme flooding makes it harder to grow produce in the intervale;

We have a federal government being run by a dangerous Trump Administration - they have frozen funding we were promised, they are degrading our civil liberties and freedoms, and they are allowing corruption to run rampant, creating a government of, by, and for the billionaire class.

We have a Governor that will once again force dozens of Vermonters out of their housing to sleep in tents, with no plan; a governor who’s failed to deliver for state employees - leading to high turnover rates and hundreds of vacant positions in state government; a governor who’s actively trying to roll back progress Vermont has made on addressing the existential threat of climate change.

In the midst of all these challenges the city council must be laser focused on addressing those issues collaboratively, but too often we spend too much time on personal attacks and partisanship. 

It’s time for a new generation of Council leadership focused on increasing collaboration and delivering results for the residents of Burlington. I look forward to working with every member of the council, from every political party, to decrease the partisanship and personal attacks and increase the collaboration and deliver results for the residents of Burlington.