jak tiano

The UVMMC MOU is a Hostage Scenario

Earlier today, I read through the final draft of the Memorandum of Understanding between the City of Burlington and the UVM Medical Center, and it was so upsetting that I had to sit down and write a letter to the City Council. Instead of only sharing privately with the council via email, I'm also posting it publicly here for all.

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Councilors,

I read through the UVMMC MOU just now and have a long winded, off-the-cuff impression that I'd like to share before the meeting tonight:

The overwhelming sense I get from reading this is that Ward 1 has a disproportionately large grip on entire city's future, and is happy to sacrifice it for their own immediate and personal gratification. Additionally, it feels like the crafting of this MOU was so strictly focused on the perceived "harms" inflicted on Ward 1, without acknowledging that meeting Ward 1's desires would be more harmful for nearly all of Chittenden County outside of that ward's boundaries. I'm sure this got plenty of deliberation in Ward 1 itself, but I have seen no real public engagement on this in other parts of the city. In effect, it feels like a hostage situation, with Ward 1 taking the medical center hostage, at the expense of the future development of this city.

In fact, this hostage scenario has been playing out in Burlington for decades as the neighborhoods around UVM/UVMMC have refused any and all change, going so far as to downzone themselves from residential medium to residential low in the 1990s to prevent new development, to as recently as early last year when they successfully carved themselves out of a city wide zoning recalibration intended to reflect the realities of the incredibly acute housing shortage in this city, county, and state.

This MOU continues that trend by baking into a city agreement a significant amount of language that is not reflective of the reality of where we are at as a city right now.

For example: "WHEREAS, many residents of the Ward 1 neighborhood adjacent to the MCHV campus are concerned that development of facilities on the MCHV campus, together with the possible future development of the adjacent facilities of the University of Vermont may further change the residential character of their neighborhood"

Let me get this straight: Burlington's Ward 1 is the epicenter of the housing shortage in Northwestern Vermont, and they're still dropping this line about the "residential character of their neighborhood"? The tremendous housing crunch we're in has turned the tides of public perception, and the "neighborhood character" argument is the thinnest it's ever been. Very few people are being fooled these days about what NIMBYism looks like and the harm it inflicts on our communities.

Ward 1 is gerrymandered around the highest density job cluster in the state (with more jobs than the Downtown core of Burlington), yet has been systematically restricted from adapting to changes by a small number of Ward 1 residents who feel entitled to a neighborhood and lifestyle frozen in amber, because... they got there first? The renters under severe housing cost burden (myself included); the young families being pushed out of the city; the medical staff forced to embark on long daily commutes; our most housing-insecure neighbors being pushed out into the streets; all of this is worth it to maintain the "morning light coming through the kitchen window", as one Ward 1 neighbor put it during Neighborhood Code public hearings. (Side note: keep your morning light! Nobody is forcing anyone to build on or subdivide their backyard! Do what you want with your own property!)

There is also repeated language throughout the MOU about making sure the neighborhood remains for "families", while tying that vision to the existence of large, spacious, single family homes. Aside from the fact that this phrasing betrays to me exactly which neighbors were involved with drafting this MOU, it's also an incredibly classist and dated view of what families today look like and need. A city that maintains significant space for detached single family homes is de-facto a city that only makes room for the wealthy. We know this, because it was a key consideration behind why we pursued and passed Neighborhood Code.

Our housing crisis is very specifically a supply shortage of homes for all income levels. Dedicating large swaths of land to the least efficient housing types is the central factor in how we got to such uniformly unaffordable housing, and we can't subsidize our way out of this mess with "Affordable Housing", as many of the Ward 1 cohort like to say. Even if we multiplied our Housing Trust Fund by 10, we could still only subsidize ~50 units of housing per year (and only for moderate incomes) in a city whose demand is for 350-1000 new homes per year, and so we're left to structural changes around land use.

To be more explicit: would we as a city rather house 10 young families of mixed (including high) incomes in a three story apartment building with a variety of 1, 2, and 3 bedroom homes, a few blocks from the largest employer in the state, or would we rather house one family that makes >$200k? Our comprehensive plan, city values, and the outcome of our Neighborhood Code rezoning says our city values the former; Ward 1 residents (and this MOU) consistently side with the latter.

Let's not beat around the bush, though: the reason that Ward 1 has managed to push through these regulatory changes to exempt itself from growth and development over the past decades is not because it is "just" or "sensible" policy, but because the residents—particularly the loud ones—are wealthy and have political influence. Why has Ward 1 remained exempt while the ONE and Downtown (and increasingly, the South End) have not? So many parts of the city are stepping up and doing (more than!) their fair share to grow and accommodate new residents, which will alleviate the region’s housing cost burden and bring new stabilizing revenues to the city, and yet affluent residents of Ward 1 continue to cry foul that they even have to see a UVM student. Ward 1 constantly plays the victim, while at the same time not shouldering any new development at all. And worse, they're willing to push that burden directly onto their neighbors to their own benefit:

"UVM Medical Center shall carry out any and all growth of its facilities within its MCHV campus, the City’s central business district, or outside the boundaries of Ward 1 in the manner allowed by applicable zoning regulations."

They don’t want UVM building housing in Ward 1, but Ward 2, 8, or 5 is okay? Why?

Taking a look at the last 10 years of housing development in the city shows a relative dearth of new units coming online in Ward 1 compared to other parts of the city. Compare the new housing construction map below with the job density map above, and think to yourself about what the implications of the housing scarcity around the University and Hospital might be on housing supply and pricing.

Not only do the residents of Ward 1 feel like they have no responsibility to grow in this moment where every corner of the state is being asked to rethink its approach to housing (VHFA says we need at least 30,000 new homes in 5 years, starting right now), but this MOU also codifies ongoing benefits Ward 1 residents expect UVM to provide for them.

The entitlement here is incredibly strong for a group of people who are not giving anything up as part of this bargain. It feels more like a mob protection racket than reasonable public policy. I could see how a set of local benefits could be a gesture of good will if the outcome of this MOU was to justifiably move Ward 1 to the RH zoning designation, in an effort to offset some of the changes they might encounter over the coming decade. But the residents give up nothing here; why are they getting rewarded for pushing their burden to the rest of the city?

As a resident of Ward 5 (which is currently working through the process of designing and building a massive new >1000 unit urban neighborhood), here's how I'm left feeling:

To reiterate what I started with: it seems to me that a small number of residents of Ward 1 have a disproportionately large finger on the scale of this city's future, and are pushing it towards their short term gain at the expense of the rest of the city, region, and state. This MOU as is reads like an unfounded wish list from the Ward 1 NPA, and absolutely not like an MOU that should come from the City of Burlington on behalf of all residents. The City of Burlington signing on to this language goes against every other stated goal the city has made, from climate, to racial and income equity, to housing, to financial stability.

Ward 1 has been developmentally stagnant and antagonizing UVM for 50 years, and everyone else is paying the price. It's time for them to contribute to the future of the city.

I do not support the UVMMC MOU as written.

-Jak Tiano