Letters to the Editor (5/14/25)

Burlington Beware

[Re “Queen City Squeeze,” May 7]: Very good article but nary a mention of the elephant in the room that will cause a slow-motion train wreck: declining commercial and business property values.

If Burlington’s Church Street Marketplace core loses its appeal and ambience, then reduced property values will manifest themselves transaction by transaction. As more become evident, those remaining will often choose to appeal their property tax valuation based on new information, and the spiral becomes self-fulfilling.

I believe Burlington is on the cusp presently and needs to make some hard but commonsense decisions.

David Stewart

South Burlington

Rethink ‘Progressive Values’

[Re “Queen City Squeeze,” May 7]: “If the city doesn’t rein in spending, residents will get priced out…” This is Burlington’s reality: reduced services that reduce quality of life — like not enough police — and ever-growing tax/fee burdens that become unaffordable. Perhaps those “progressive values” are unrealistic?

Tim Gray

Duxbury

Wrong About Greensboro

This is one of the most one-sided news stories that I have ever read [“Greensboro Voters Reject Affordable Housing Project,” May 8, online].

Sixty percent of a large voter turnout rejected a spectacularly inadequate plan presented by the current selectboard, with support from the previous selectboard as well.

The “plan” was not well designed, thoughtful, comprehensive or well documented. Voters rejected it because they did not want to see their town hall turned into apartments and because they did not think that the selectboard was competent to do its job in this situation, which is to look out for the best interests of the town.

They are not opposed to having affordable housing in Greensboro. I reject the use of words such as “underused,” “well-heeled” and “derelict.” To suggest that Greensboro is a gated community is mean and ignorant. I know many people who opposed this “plan.” They have lived here all of their lives, working hard seven days a week to pay their bills and care for their families. They are not “well-heeled,” nor am I. I have never lived in a gated community, but I strongly suspect that these longtime hardworking residents do not have the attitudes and prejudices that many gated community residents have.

I asked Mateo Kehler weeks ago to sit down with town residents and listen to their concerns. He never responded. He is much more content whining and complaining that the town won’t give him what he wants.

Brian Titus

Greensboro

Nothing ‘Ad Hoc’ About It

[Re “Vermont Lawyers Rally for the Rule of Law in the Age of Trump,” May 3, online]: Anne Galloway’s otherwise cogent summary of the Vermont Lawyers March in Burlington on May 3 missed the mark on one key detail: mischaracterizing our legendary community samba band as an “ad hoc bongo-and-drum corps.”

Sambatucada! has brought the joy of samba rhythms to community events and festivals across Vermont since 1995. Our 30-plus members rehearse weekly and perform pulsating Brazilian folkloric percussion rhythms that motivate and bring joy to participants and onlookers. If she had asked, she would have learned we were invited by the organizers and performed at no charge for this important march. It didn’t happen by itself, and there was nothing “ad hoc” about it. (We usually perform in band uniforms but didn’t wear them that day because it was raining.)

Sambatucada! has open rehearsals in Burlington every week and welcomes new members to join. For more info, find us on the web at sambatucada.org.

Larry Lewack

Burlington

Vermont Writers for Ozturk

None of us know Rumeysa Ozturk, beyond the single fact that she is being held in prison and threatened with deportation because she wrote an op-ed article. But that is enough for all of us to identify with her, because we’ve all written op-eds, too — in college newspapers, but also in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, the Guardian, the Chicago Tribune, the San Francisco Chronicle — and here in Vermont, for papers such as the Burlington Free Press, the Addison County Independent and the Bennington Banner. In those hundreds and thousands of articles we’ve never ever thought to fear that the government would dispatch masked men, bundle us into unmarked vehicles and disappear us into the bowels of the correctional system. Ms. Ozturk deserves no less right — she was here in America with every right to speak her mind.

We’re sure that her goal in life was not to become famous as an op-ed writer, nor has it been ours. This is almost by definition secondary work: to reporting, to scholarship, to activism. But it is nonetheless an important part of civic life — our communities and our country are richer for the free expression of ideas. If those ideas are wrong, then others will say so — that’s how ideas work.

We are saddened that our government wants to suppress ideas and shocked by the brutality they’ll deal out in the course of that suppression. We hope that in some small way we can help free our fellow practitioner of this necessary art so that she can resume speaking out. That’s the point of America, or it should be.

David Goodman

Waterbury

Garrett Graff

Montpelier

Sue Halpern

Ripton

Garret Keizer

Sutton

Bill McKibben

Ripton

Gus Speth

Strafford

Alison Bechdel

Bolton

David Moats

Salisbury

Editor’s note: This group letter was submitted a day before the May 9 release of Rumeysa Ozturk. Seven Days reporter Colin Flanders covered the breaking news in the online story headlined, “Vermont Judge Orders Feds to Release Tufts Student.”

Big Education

In your interesting story [“The Learning Lobby,” April 30], there is no indication of a lobby for two of the biggest factors in public education.

First of all, students. There seems to be little outcry for what many perceive to be a steady decline in the quality of public education in Vermont.

The second is the overburdened taxpayers of Vermont. The Vermont Principals’ Association, Vermont Superintendents Association and the National Education Association are all advocates for making the lives of their members better and their jobs better paying — the role of a union. Even when enrollment was steadily declining, there was no effort to get rid of some administrators.

Legislators may offer lip service to lowering cost of education, but results are not there.

There is a saying about the same mind that created a problem cannot be the one to solve it. The cost of education goes up every year, and the quality appears to be going down. The legislature and these lobbying groups have presided over the increasing cost and lower quality, and I do not expect them to be the ones to change our present course.

Big government supports all the other “Bigs,” and, in this case, it is education.

Russell Newton

Essex Junction

‘The Vs Don’t Get It’

According to [“The Learning Lobby,” April 30], the so-called “Vs” — the Vermont Principals’ Association, Vermont Superintendents Association, Vermont School Boards Association — are concerned that Gov. Phil Scott’s school district consolidation plan would lead to “school closures, staffing loss, longer bus rides for students and a loss of local control.” So, what do the Vs propose? Forming a working group to study the problem and pushing any restructuring off until July 2029. That’s four more years of political wrangling and potential property tax increases. Sure, the four concerns the Vs listed would probably happen to some degree. However, the governor’s plan would save money and help prevent skyrocketing property tax increases. Kick the can down the road for four more years? The Vs just don’t get it.

Terry Souers

Brandon

Fight for AmeriCorps

By this time many are aware of the federal budget cuts over the past month that have led to the dismissal of AmeriCorps members across the state and nation [“Vermont AmeriCorps Programs in Limbo After Trump Cuts,” April 29, online]. My reason for writing is to highlight the significance of AmeriCorps in my life and seek your support.

My AmeriCorps service began here in Vermont, supporting access to education, and took me across the country to the Midwest, supporting conservation and affordable housing; later to Texas, providing disaster relief; and most recently to the West Coast, mitigating wildfires. My personal contribution alone totals more than 3,000 hours of direct service. While this feels good to know, the real benefits were my personal development, the tangible community impact and the many relationships I was able to build through my AmeriCorps service.

Recently I have been onboarding in a new role, and AmeriCorps is naturally an element of my introduction. I have found, more often than not, I am among fellow AmeriCorps alumni who share a love of service and, like me, were led to a career in the nonprofit sector following their AmeriCorps service.

I am no expert, but this observation has led me to believe that the elimination of AmeriCorps is not only an unfortunate loss for today’s young adults across the nation but that it will also lead to a shift in the pursuit of social sector careers across the country.

I urge readers to stand against this decision to cut funding for AmeriCorps by contacting your members of Congress today.

Erica Fuller

Hancock