This week’s Burlington, Vermont City Council meeting was dominated by advocates upset over a report critical of the city’s former Racial Equity Inclusion and Belonging office director.
Burlington officials hired an independent accounting firm to conduct a financial review of the department during fiscal years 2021 and 2022. At the time Tyeastia Green was director. The study was requested after reports from Minneapolis, where she was previously that city’s Racial Equity Inclusion and Belonging director, found financial issues relating to Black History Month events there.
Burlington officials hired Sheehey Furlong & Behm PC to review the office, especially planning of the city’s Juneteenth celebration. The 18-page report, posted online last Thursday, states: “...we found no evidence of embezzlement or theft, nor could we conclude that fraud had been committed with respect to Juneteenth 2022. However, there does appear to have been mismanagement or carelessness prior to Juneteenth 2022....”
Green responded in an interview on WCAXin Burlington, saying the report exonerated her in not finding any embezzlement and called Mayor Miro Weinberger, a Democrat, a white supremacist for requesting the review.
During the City Council meeting on Monday, members of the BIPOC community were impassioned and occasionally disruptive during public comments. Fareen Paris Meyer directed her narrative to Council President Karen Paul as she criticized the mayor.
“I, Karen, am asking you to let me know what you will do as council president this evening to ensure that we are not aligning this agenda to support a mayor of our city that has blasted a witch hunt on former director Tyeastia Green.”
Rachel Siegel and Jule Masuda together outlined a number of instances they say highlight a double standard, with Masuda noting a recent report on the TIF district.
“In January of this year, the Vermont State Auditor completed an audit of Burlington lakefront Tax Increment Financing TIF district. The audit showed quote years of sloppy record keeping and financial mismanagement. To our knowledge, there has been no broad public accounting for how the city intends to rectify the issues raised.”
“We cannot understand," Siegel added, "the administration's decision to spend precious time and resources on an investigation that seems so out of alignment with previous responses and creates further division in our community.”
Speaker Todd Lacroix stirred up the emotions of the crowd.
“There's so much hypocrisy going around in America. I see so much selective outrage from people like you. Black people and everybody in America do the same thing. You see how vehement it gets when you even want to talk about the problems? And now they want to shut me up. See how violent this is. I can't even get through my statement because I'm getting assaulted for the same hypocrises and I don’t see any Black people caring about my assaults.”
“Shame on you," members of the crowd shout. "Shame on you.”
After several minutes of uproar the council took a recess to allow things to calm down. Later the city’s Chief Administrative Officer provided answers to questions that had previously been submitted by councilors about the report including confidentiality, conflicts of interest, and the cost of the report – which totaled $41,000. Ward 1 Progressive Zoraya Hightower moved to not accept the report and instead refer the materials to the Human Resources committee to consider a public articulation of harm by Mayor Weinberger and the city.
“For the continued defamation of character and unwarranted actions taken through city processes like the audit itself, and an apology of the same. We also ask the HR committee to establish a process for independent evaluation and oversight of the hiring and retention policies and solutions employed by the City of Burlington to combat anti-BIPOC and gender-based discriminatory practices.”
But the city’s acting attorney warned about the legality of the motion. Following a recess Hightower amended the motion removing references to the mayor and defamation.
The amended motion passed unanimously.
Weinberger didn’t comment during the meeting. In an email statement, he responded to allegations he is a white supremacist: "I have always sought to have constructive conversations about our City and to encourage vigorous debate. That does not include personal attacks. Some of the words used to describe me Monday night do not reflect my vision for the city or my values, and I reject them."
Weinberger spokesperson Samantha Sheehan adds that the purpose of the financial review of the REIB department “is about responsible oversight of taxpayer funds and the success of Burlington's equity initiatives.....To not have conducted this investigation in light of the events in Minneapolis would have been professional malfeasance."
On March 10th 2022 Green left the position, which is currently held by Kim Carson.
