A youngster peers at a pair of F-35 jets at an Open House held by the Vermont Air National Guard at the airbase in South Burlington on September 11, 2022. File hoto by Glenn Russell/VTDigger
This story by Liberty Darr was first published in The Other Paper on Oct. 10
South Burlington joined Burlington and Winooski Monday in passing a resolution that calls on federal lawmakers to find an alternative to the F-35 air mission in Vermont.
The F-35s replaced the former F-16s at the Patrick Leahy Burlington International Airport in South Burlington in 2019, sparking years of vehement opposition from residents in its flight path due to “bone-jarring” noise and undue environmental impacts caused by the military aircraft.
Two city councilors, city clerk Mike Scanlan and Elizabeth Fitzgerald, voted against the move.
With Sen. Patrick Leahy now retired and a new makeup of Vermont’s congressional delegation, Council Chair Tim Barritt said “there is an opportunity to try this again, to see if they would be sympathetic to requests from the various city councils in the towns and cities that immediately surround the airport that are affected by takeoff and landing noise from the F-35.”
Barritt voiced his respect for the work and the commitment of the Air National Guard, but said the noise is simply inharmonious with the area.
“It’s just an incompatible use. Period,” he said, noting the nearly 200 homes in the Chamberlin neighborhood of South Burlington that have been lost due to the noise impacts. “I think most people who have stood in the wake of the F-35s taking off will agree that that noise is very, very, very high. I think that if there is this coalition of cities that make this request, the delegation might actually listen and see what they can do.”
Councilors Laurie Smith and Andrew Chalnick brought the resolution forward to the South Burlington City Council on the heels of similar resolutions passed in the neighboring cities of Burlington and Winooski in August and September, respectively.
“We have thousands of citizens in these three cities dramatically impacted by intolerable noise,” Smith said, noting that sound mitigation efforts by the airport will only go so far. “It’s important to acknowledge that we have citizens who are being harmed every day.”
This is not the first time the city council has considered a written resolution about the fighter jet. In 2016, the council even joined a federal lawsuit against the secretary of the Air Force regarding the decision to base the fighter jet at the Burlington International Airport.
A resolution passed two years later resolved that South Burlington would stand in solidarity with Burlington and Winooski in their request that the U.S. Air Force cancel the F-35s at the airport and instead find an alternative aircraft.
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Barritt, who was also a council member then, signed that resolution. Meaghan Emery, vice chair of the council at that time, also signed.
“I know that three of you were going door-to-door this past winter to be elected,” Emery told the city council Monday night. “I myself have done so for years, and I have been met with people at their doors in tears, not able to live in peace anymore since the basing of the F-35.”
Scanlan urged the council to bring the question to voters on Town Meeting Day.
“Our senators have emphasized focusing on noise mitigation efforts, which Sen. Peter Welch underscored just last year, as does our recently adopted 2024 city plan. Advocating for increased federal funds to accelerate the mitigation effort is where I believe we can have the most impact,” he said.
Fitzgerald similarly argued that this resolution poses no new information to members of the congressional delegation — Welch, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Becca Balint — who have been well-publicized as supporting the F-35 mission.
“The notion that a council resolution from South Burlington will turn the tide is unfounded,” she said, but also noted that she does think the quality of life for residents would be enhanced without the noise. “I find it difficult to support a resolution with no teeth in it and one which takes a position by a council that has not prioritized or planned for the consequences of urging our delegation to urge the Air Force to consider a different aviation mission for the Air Guard.”
She pointed out that a move to adopt the resolution would be disingenuous to the entire South Burlington community since the council has no prioritizations in its current city or strategic plans to do anything beyond the resolution.
Emery told the council Monday night that she was disappointed in the two councilors who were voicing opposition to the resolution, explaining that the job of a councilor is to represent the constituents of South Burlington, not the Air Force or Washington delegation.
“I thank the three of you for taking the leadership,” she said. “I’m disappointed at two of you who are speaking for Congress — not having spoken to our congressmen and woman — or for speaking for the Air Force. That conversation is not for us. Our conversation is for the people living here in South Burlington. Whether or not it is a priority, it is a time to act.”
Read the story on VTDigger here: South Burlington City Council passes F-35 resolution.