The new mayor of Burlington, Vermont has been in office for two weeks now. Progressive Emma Mulvaney-Stanak is the city’s first woman and first openly LGBTQIA individual to hold the office. Speaking with WAMC North Country Bureau Chief Pat Bradley, Mulvaney-Stanak says she’s focused on a strong start with a great staff:
I was able to start on my first day with three appointed staff members. I had to hire those folks rather quickly during the transition period, which was essentially two and a half weeks. So that was quite the list. But the folks are so well qualified for these roles and hit the ground running and haven't blinked at any of the big things we were asked to really take on. We had the Eclipse, which we hosted several thousands of people in Burlington for the Eclipse, especially for having clear skies. And so this team was really one of the biggest pieces. The other big operational piece, of course, is the mayor Burlington has 18 direct reports of department heads. So I've been diligently meeting with every single department head. I started even before I was sworn in and I have, I think, two left to meet with and that's been great for relationship building, understanding the objectives and the opportunities and challenges facing our department heads, but also because there's appointment decisions to be made before June 30th with the folks who lead those departments.
Speaking of the department heads, that was a question on my list. When and how close are you to appointing or reappointing the department heads and will there be significant changes?
Well, as I said during the campaign and I am a woman who is good to my word, continuity of government is a very important aspect of leading the city right now. And so I intend to really be very thoughtful if there were any folks that were not going to be reappointed. Right now, there's only two roles that are known to be vacant. Where I know that a department head is either not there, it's the city attorney, where we've had a vacancy for a year and a half, or where someone has another professional opportunity before the election, frankly, and that was our planning director. But those are the two positions I'm focusing on right now to make sure I have someone in the queue and ready to be appointed for June 30th. And in the meantime, I'm meeting with the other department heads to really know their intentions, to see where they align with my vision for the city, to really make sure that folks know this is a two-way street. We need to be able to work together. I'm expecting folks to come with an ability to work collaboratively across departments, regardless of what department they lead, needing folks to be really creative and innovative because we have a big budget challenge ahead of us. And so if folks were able to rise to that occasion and to this new administration I will be excited to reappoint those folks. But this is still a decision that's a little ways off. But I'm doing my due diligence in these coming weeks to make sure I am appointing a team that really can help Burlington take this next big step forward to, towards the vision that I articulated in the campaign.
Mayor, you outlined a number of issues that you want to address during your campaign. As you settle into the office, which ones do you think will really take priority and you find that you'll be able to work on first.
So the first two priorities really out of the campaign that I'm really focused on, and I'm a big one about if you say your priorities you have to have a pretty short list otherwise you're not really going to be able to be effective. So community safety is priority number one. And the second piece is, out of necessity, is putting together this budget for the next fiscal year. I have a very short ramp for that given the way that the transition of government here is in Burlington. I have to present a budget to city council, ideally, by mid-May or so. And that's a very short amount of time to put together and understand, frankly, what is being handed to me from the prior administration and understanding what this budget gap that we're facing, what really that entails. And so that will probably be the very first thing because that's a deadline just right around the corner. We're looking, I'm already working with the CAO (Chief Administrative Officer) and our chief financial officer as well. I'll be convening a series of community or a group of community advisors, including some formerly elected folks here in Burlington. We'll be sharing those names in the next day or so, to really help dive in and ask big questions that will help be guiding principles for how to build a sustainable budget. Because what I talked about in the campaign is one around transparency with our budget, but also affordability and making sure that we are delivering a budget that Burlingtonians can afford and being very mindful about whether or not we increase the public safety tax, which voters were generous enough to place as a tool that we can utilize around authorizing a higher tax in that for that dedicated tax. But I take it very seriously around whether or not we are going to use that to make sure that we are building a budget that is sustainable, that eliminates duplicative jobs, and positions if necessary, and we really are making sure that we are maintaining services, but we're doing so in a pragmatic and affordable way for Burlington. The second piece around community safety is very important. I mean, it's the biggest thing we talked about during the campaign. And yet, I really am dedicated to having a much more comprehensive understanding of how all of our departments have been interfacing with community safety. And while I'll be presenting in that budget includes the Special Assistant on Community Safety that would serve within my office, because it is such a critical point to make sure we have someone solely focused on doing a deep analysis of how we've been doing, really being able to put some new ideas and look at innovation happening in other places in this country, where cities or small cities are facing similar dynamics, and putting support solutions that we can both do immediately and then longer term solutions around how do we structure our government? And how are folks interfacing with the city when we know that there's so many interdependent issues that are impacting people who cause harm in our community. And that includes any range of issues that really don't have, none of them have a simple easy solution to them around why people commit harm in their community, whether it's retail theft or other harm related to drugs and whatnot. So for me, this is really about getting it right and having some expertise and some, a hyperfocus with using the special assistant role in particular to start doing that really critical work.
Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak, one week after you were sworn in, you had a large event occur. The eclipse passed right over Burlington and a huge number of people had come into the city. From a lay person's point of view, it looked like everything went smoothly. How did it go? As mayor, I'm sure you were monitoring a lot of different things.
Well from the mayor's perspective it went really well. And I'm extremely proud and appreciative of the city employees. We had so many departments working well alongside each other to pull that off. We, as the weather prediction became clearer and literally had clear skies and most of the other path of totality across the United States did not have such a weather forecast, we were ready. We were ready to receive even more guests than I think we initially anticipated. And the best thing about seeing Department of Public Works and Burlington City Arts, which is actually the main event coordinator in terms of our city departments, and then fire and police and all sorts of other city employees also stepped forward to help staff tents and do event support throughout the city. What that really showed me is that there is a deep commitment to this community by the folks who work for the city and folks were ready to offer their best to both local residents but also guests to the city who were here to enjoy the event. So it's extremely proud. We had no major incidences at all, which I was really relieved about. But I also knew that if anything were to come up that our city was very well prepared to handle that.
Mayor, one of the things about having so many people visit the city is that they're going to spend some money and the city receives a portion of the gross receipts tax. You mentioned in your inaugural address that there's a budget shortfall. And with the city getting part of that gross receipts tax is there any idea right now how much eclipse visitation might boost the general fund? Or had that been accounted for already in determining this budget shortfall?
Well, unfortunately it's a bit of a lag. The money goes first to the state and then it comes back to local governments. And so we don't actually know those figures quite yet. I've seen the Department of Tourism state that they anticipated the state getting somewhere around $50 million or so. But we're still not clear what Burlington’s piece of that will be. It will certainly help. But there unfortunately, is no, that will not solve the budget, the budget gap that we have going into next year. And I think for, if anything, I'm just glad that Burlington put such a good event on because we did hear anecdotally many people talk about how they're going to return to Burlington to visit again this summer, this fall, because they had such a positive experience. And that's exactly the kind of thing I want folks to know about Burlington. This is an incredible community to visit, to live in. We could put on some amazing events. There's such a positivity about that, that will permeate out and attract more tourists to this community and that's exactly what we need as we head into the summer and fall.
Emma Mulvaney-Stanak, what has surprised you about being mayor so far?
You know, you give me the hardest questions! I would say the thing that has surprised me the most is how wildly different this job is literally hour to hour. The types of complex topics you talk about. But then also there really joyful aspects of being the leader of this amazing city. Just this weekend, I was able to deliver a proclamation to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Lyric Theatre, which is a community-based theatre company that has hundreds of volunteers who put on musical theater shows throughout the year. They've done an amazing amount of partnership to help the Flynn Theatre, which is one of our crown jewels if you will. I can see it right outside my office right now. And it was just this great moment to read a proclamation to a theater full of people who were here downtown in Burlington about to celebrate the Wizard of Oz show. So that was really great. And then, you know, I have, then I'll go to the next day and have a two hour meeting diving deep into the budget and quickly trying to get up to speed on what are our options for making sure we're delivering a sound budget. And then I'll teeter over somewhere else and have a whole other conversation on understanding the inter workings of the fire department and our capital needs around our historic fire station that's in the central district here downtown and really grappling with long term planning issues for the city. So it's been amazing. I'm still so grateful and energized by the voters of Burlington affirming their belief in my leadership to lead this city forward and really just, I take that with great responsibility but great excitement about what's ahead.
Burlington Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak was elected on Town Meeting Day and sworn in on April 1st, replacing Democrat Miro Weinberger, who did not seek a fifth term.
