Novice sailors spilled off a school bus and onto the sun-soaked docks at the Community Sailing Center in Burlington, then boarded the four 23-foot boats reserved just for them.
The crew of fourth graders from Essex was ready to take on the high seas of Lake Champlain — only they couldn’t find the wind. It was a still May morning, and the small flotilla bobbed in languid water.
Aboard one of the craft, Water Music, instructor Kurt Haigis pointed offshore to a spot where tiny ripples had formed on the lake’s surface. Those are baby waves, he told the students, created by mere whispers of wind.
“What do waves grow up to be?” Haigis asked.
“A tsunami!” one student said. “A hurricane!” guessed another.
The correct answer, it turned out, was whitecaps — a sign that winds had reached ideal sailing speeds of 10 nautical miles per hour. Was the crew ready to cast off? A chorus of “yeses” propelled Water Music from the dock.
The primer on wind velocity was one of several science lessons tucked into an otherwise basic boating course, or at least an enviable field trip. At the sailing center, offering more than just Rigging 101 is kind of the point.
A 30-year-old nonprofit dedicated to creating access to Lake Champlain, the sailing center offers summer camps, sailboat and paddlecraft rentals, and private sailing lessons on the waterfront. In recent years, the center has added new programs — and better promoted existing ones — to bust sailing’s reputation as a sport only for elites. And it’s done so while managing the financial strain of building a modern new facility and boat launch on the waterfront. Now, after eight years of fundraising to pay off loans, the sailing center is finally debt-free.
“This is probably going to be one of our rosiest, best years.” Owen Milne
As other nonprofits reel from economic uncertainty and the loss of federal funds, the Community Sailing Center sees sunny days ahead.
“We don’t have that great cloud hanging overhead anymore,” said Owen Milne, the center’s executive director. “It’s a rare thing to hear about in the news these days, but this is probably going to be one of our rosiest, best years.”
Situated next to the Andy A_Dog Williams Skatepark on Lake Street, the three-story sailing center is all white walls and polished concrete floors. An expansive garage stores some of the center’s 150-boat fleet, and a top-floor covered terrace provides stunning views of Burlington Bay.
The digs are a major upgrade from the Moran Plant, the defunct power station where the center rented space when it was created in 1994. Construction of the new building was winding down in late 2017 when Milne, newly hired, learned that his nonprofit no longer qualified for a $1.9 million tax credit intended to cover about a third of the project cost. The center, which has a $1.4 million annual budget, had to take out a loan to stay afloat.
The new space opened in 2018, but without a key piece: its own boat launch. Staff members had to haul dinghies to a channel at the nearby Moran Plant — an inconvenience for any one boater but a practical nightmare for an instructor supervising 100 antsy summer campers.
Still in debt, the center launched a $4.2 million campaign in 2019 to build a new boat hoist, deepwater basin and 50-foot-wide wheelchair-accessible boat ramp. The new amenities opened last May, and this spring, the center paid off its last loan.
“Instead of spending money on concrete and steel, now it’s on kids and sailors,” Milne said.
To survive the arduous journey, the center learned to appeal to donors outside of the sailing world — including those skeptical of it.
WaterWheel Foundation executive director Beth Montouri Rowles was one of those skeptics. She questioned whether the center was a good fit for WaterWheel, the philanthropic arm of storied jam band Phish, when Milne first approached her several years ago. A power-boater herself, Montouri Rowles thought of sailing as a rich person’s sport.
Then, in 2021, Milne pitched her on the Diversity Access Initiative, a new program that would cover up to four years of summer camp tuition for kids who identify as people of color. If the campers agree to return as instructors, they sail free for life. Parents receive a $30 weekly stipend to cover the cost of transporting kids to camp, and lunch is provided.
Montouri Rowles was sold — WaterWheel became the program’s first backer, with a $21,000 donation. “It took a while for me to realize they’re valuing the same things that we’re valuing,” she said.
To get the kids sailing, the center worked with Trusted Community Voices, a Burlington initiative that helps immigrant families become more engaged in civic life. It took effort to get parents to trust the center with their kids, some of whom don’t know how to swim, let alone sail. Every year before camp, families are invited to tour the center, which features wayfinding signs translated into six languages. Kids put on life preservers to learn basic swim strokes in the lake.
In just four years, children of color went from representing 1 percent of the center’s 500 annual summer campers to 25 percent. More kids, of all colors, are returning to camp year after year, too — nearly twice as many as before the diversity initiative started, Milne said. The program has since been recognized by US Sailing, the national organization that trains Olympians, and CBS Morning News, which visited and recorded a story that aired in July 2022.
“The organization hasn’t stood still,” former board member Doug Merrill said. “We keep developing.”
Floating Classrooms, the program that taught the Essex students to sail last week, has been a staple for more than a decade. But only recently did the center begin promoting its focus on science education. The curriculum caught the attention of Jane Batten, a philanthropist from Norfolk, Va., whose husband cofounded the Weather Channel.
Batten isn’t a sailor, Milne said, but her foundation supports dozens of early education and science-based programs across the country.
Last week, the crew of fourth graders learned about Lake Champlain’s watershed with the help of a 3D model. Using Kool-Aid powder as a stand-in for pesticides, education manager Hannah Walton turned on a hose to demonstrate what happens when it rains.
“It’s going into the lake!” one student cried as the powder liquefied and trickled through miniature valleys into the mock Champlain, turning it a murky purple.
“They learn about sailing, but they also learn about lake conservation,” said Haigis, the instructor, as he corralled the students to the equipment room. “I say that we’re teaching a whole new group of kids who hopefully will turn into conservationists rather than consumers.”
Milne himself grew up playing tennis as a scholarship kid at summer camp and didn’t learn how to sail until he started working at the center. The executive director, who now uses a wheelchair, has become an avid skipper of a boat adapted for sailors with mobility challenges.
Milne is loath to take credit for the center’s success, though he’s been honored for it. The center has won three national awards in five years, including US Sailing’s Outstanding Organizational Leader Award, which was presented to Milne in February.
Milne “has really been a salvation to the place,” said Pat Robins, one of the center’s founding members. “He’s followed through on all these dreams.”
Last week, Milne sat in his office, preparing for a lunchtime meeting with donors. Smiling, he listened to the stampede of students bounding across the deck upstairs and mused on the center’s progress — a slew of new boats, a shiny new waterfront facility, a cadre of instructors who started out as campers.
“This is what winning looks like,” he said.
Half an hour earlier, Water Music and her crew returned from their voyage. Without much wind, the sailors had resorted to paddling a bit to get around. But they weren’t deflated. “That was awesome!” several students said as they streamed off the dock.
“Steering the boat’s not that hard, bro,” one boy told another.
Just an hour on the lake and already a captain. “Winning” indeed.
The original print version of this article was headlined “Smooth Sailing | No longer swamped with debt, Burlington’s Community Sailing Center brings boating to the people”
Related Stories
Burlington’s Community Sailing Center Makes Lake Champlain Accessible to All
This article appears in The Summer Preview 2025.
Got something to say?
Send a letter to the editor and we'll publish your feedback in print!
