DRAFT Chittenden County 2026 ECOS Regional Plan | Supplement 4: Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy

A segment of my neighborhood was developed 2015-2020-ish and I researched their sales prices were $422K- $1M. The developer destroyed prime forested lands, parts of a deer wintering area and Class II and Class III wetlands and violated stormwater permit conditions in order to build these McMansions on tree-bereft vast green yards. Give us a break- these prices do not represent the environmental costs we have to pay, do not represent what is being cranked out here locally. (Wondering are you including dilapidated "fixer-uppers" to lower the median $?) We bought our home in 2003 for nearly 1/2 the price and the quality/ longevity of its structure and stability within its environs is far better in comparison to the new builds. Someone is raking in major $s off of selling what I call lemons: homes on properties that are going to experience extreme soil erosion because they were once forested, on soils that are not supportive of grass lawn, that now require tons of fertilizer to maintain green lawns and (if ever discontinued or if weather conditions change), soil erosion and stormwater will become unmanageable. But they've sold us on "it's good for the economy and we're fulfilling "affordable housing" stock -because these wealthy landowners can manipulate (via the white male buddy network and the current drive to build, build, build) the local governing system so that it passively allows any building to occur- even where it should not take place. We all see this and know this to be true.

How is it we are paying more than 30% of our household incomes on housing? Could it be that our gazillion financial institutions within a square mile of our Town of Essex are performing predatory lending practices on Essex Town residents? A question CCRPC could look into. Those bank and credit union mortgage calculators don't seem to be working quite like they used to a few decades ago... or we wouldn't be seeing >30%, me thinks.

Is it any wonder? We know that our racist, oppressive systems have created the situation where Black families have less generational wealth and couldn't afford the down payment plus mortgage payments for $400K plus house. So let's keep on building houses that are out of their price range because our developers can. And let's pretend that they are building houses that are $400K plus and meet our criteria as "affordable housing". Yippee yeah, HOME Act is coming to its fruition, just as its sponsors want it to. Ask the guy who bought a $950K house built on a 13% slope with a serpentine twist at the bottom of his driveway, sloped so all of his driveway salt treatment drains into the Winooski River, along with the phosphorus from the fertilizer he'll have to treat his yard forever or will have to address soil erosion issues because his developers clear cut all the trees off of his nutrient-poor soils on his property. This is how we do it here in the Green Mountains of Vermont.

I choose not to be insured. What your dollars go towards are not worth it. I wouldn't want my son, nor even a pet, to have to suffer as I did under their "care". I know from my patient advocacy work that I am not alone in thinking this way- that far too many of us are being medically-harmed, medically- neglected or un-alived under the "care" of these "health professionals" in our US health system. Patient Safety data warn us we are in a crisis and this country is not aware nor engaged- we're no where near getting us out. If you want Quality Patient Care, look elsewhere, not here. Hold out until this country takes on its responsibility to provide the American Public full funding for its general Welfare (Article 1 Section 8, US Constitution).