You are on page 1of 3

v o E R M N

,
O C H L Y O W N E D C O M M U N I T Y N E W S P A P E R
I t ' s 1 9 8 1 a n d B e r n i e S a n d e r s h a s n ' t b e a t e n i n c u m b e n t
M a y o r G o r d o n P a q u e t t e b y t e n v o t e s - h e ' s l o s t . P o l i t i c a l
f a n t a s y ? M a y b e . B u t w h a t w o u l d i t b e l i k e :
B u r l i n g t o n
W i t h o u t B e r n i e
By Geo rge Layng
an d Dwight Gamer
T
wo ye ar s ag o r i g h t -wi n g jo u r n al i st an d
Rolling Stone co rrespo ndent P.J .
O'R o urke decided it was high time co n-
se r vat i ve s came u p wi t h an o t h e r
Enemies List, like the o nes Nixo n
used to co mpile and keep handy. J ust to
keep tabs o nto day's liberal bad guys.
So O'R o urke set to it.
Onhis list were mo st o f the usual big-
name suspects -J esse J ackso n, Sting,
"an yo n e n ame d Co ckbu r n ." Fu r t h e r do wn
t h e l i st , t h o u g h , o n e n ame st u ck o u t : "B u r -
lingto n, Vt., M ayo r Peter Clav elle."
Je e z, l e ft i st B u r l i n g t o n r e ade r s mu st h ave
tho ught to themselv es happily, we're really
o nthe map. But tho se same readers surely
also realized Peter Clav elle isn't the guy who
put us there - o r the guy who belo nged o n
O'R o urke's dubio us Who 's Who fev er chart.
T he man O'R o urke was really after, a
man who at the timehad tempo rarily faded
fr o m vi e w, was o n e ve r y r ambu n ct i o u s, ve r y
co mmitted ex-Burlingto n mayo r and current
Continued on Page 14
B U R L I N G T O N W I T H O U T B E R N I E ' .: :~
. . . B e r n i e
Continued from Page 1
VeTmont congressman named
B ernie Sanden.
Simply put, had B ernie
Senders not exiated - that is,
had he lost the 1981 mayoral
election by 10 votes over five-
term Democratic Mayor Gordon
Paquette, instead of winning by
that same margin - Peter
Clavelle would now be just
another anonymous N ice Guy
lodged inmid-level government,
one of many slices of banana
forever suspended in the
bureaucratic jello.
Which starts you thinking. If
Sanders hadn't pulled it off,
what else would have gone dif-
ferently here over the last
decade?
Plucking Sanden out of the
picture - the way Jimmy
Stewart was plucked out of B el-
lows Falls by his angel,
Clarence, in I t's A W onderful
L ife - doesn't mean the Queen
City would have become some
grim, surly Pottersville, where
children are scorned and nobody
will help an old lady across the
atreet. B ut as ameans of getting
a handle on the last 10 years,
thinking about the area sans
B ernie does seem like a
worthwhile proposition.
Whither Leunig's?
So here's our scenario:
Sandera, who by 1981 has al-
-readytwice lOB tTllce8 for gover-
nor (1972, 1976) and U.S.
Senator (1972, 1974) by whop-
pingmargins, l_toPaquette,
curses his luck and quits
politics. He returns to documen-
tary filmmaking, an early love,
and moves toFlint, Mich. (There
he scoops Michael Moore and
makes an amusing populist -
and popular - film critique of
General Moton called R oger &
Me, and becomes a wildly ges-
ticulating regular on late-night
television.)
What then? Would B ur-
lington have become an over-
developed asphalt jungle,
Vermont's answer to Seattle,
full of looming buildings like
Courthouse Plaza on Main
Street? Would the rich have got-
ten even richer than they did,
and the poor screwed even more
vigorously? Would those
nomadic hordes of B irkenstock-
clad, reggae-loving, ecologically
literate, bumper-sticker happy
folks have sent R SVPs instead?
More questions: Would
Leunig's cafe, that political
hothouse where the espresso is
always potent and Kurt Weill
forever on the soundtrack, now
be a fluorescent-lit donut - er,
doughnut - shop? Would the
Southern Connector have bar-
reled through town, gutting old
neighborhoods and encouraging
suburbanites to shop and flee?
Would people like State R ep.
Terry B ouricius be, as one per-
son suggested, off teaching
dance? And how about Peter
Smith? Would he be con-
gressman for life?
We asked some people for
their thoughts. After a laugh,
mOB tdescribed thehypothetical-
ly 'BeTnie-Free city as a bigger,
mOTedeveloped place. Having
said that, they split into twofair-
ly neat camps. B usinesspeople
and conservatives had visions of
a happier, healthier city with
Sanders gone; more liberal
respondents, as you might im-
agine, begged to differ.
The first thing we wondered
was, who would have run the
city throughout the '80s? Cer-
tainly not Gordon Paquette, at
least not for much longer. I n
1981 the former grocer and
bread-truck driver was already
in his mid-60s, and he was
beginning to seem less like the
city's curmudgeonly old
grandfather than a party guest
who wouldn't leave. (I t didn't
help matters when a police of-
ficer reported Paquette had
shown up drunk at a 1977 Su-
pertramp concert.)
'The Democratic Party ... the
Paquette-Contois machine, had
pretty much run out of gas,"
DVM political science professor
Garrison N elson recalled.
The only question, really,
would bewhich Democrat would
succeed Paquette. W ar a look at
several who might have been
King, see sidebar this page.) Ac-
cording to N elson, B urlington
was - and would likely have
remained - a Democratic town,
and the battle would have been
between the liberal and conser-
vative wings.
"The R epublican Party was
basically afringe party," hesaid.
Creeping Suburbia
Sanders' defeat likely would
have meant the political move-
ment nowknown as the Progres-
sive Coalition would never have
bloomed, or at least not nearly as
fully. Sanders galvanized many
previously discordant voices,
and he gave them a political
machine and base, observers
say. While afewof the Progres-
sives might occasionally have
won office, they would not have
proven much of an obstacle to
real estate developers.
So with B ernie off in Flint,
B urlington would have looked
different. The Church Street
marketplace - a Paquette
project - would still be there.
B ut an afternoon stroll would
have revealed higher and more
dense downtown development,
B ernie's admirers and critics
agree.
"We would have seen a lot
more emphasis on physical
development in the '80s," said
R epublican Councilman Allen
Gear.
What they don't agree on is
what effect the development
would have had. B oth Demo-
crats and R epublicans believe a
continued pro-business environ-
ment - one where the word
socialism is heard only in DVM
poll-sci classes - would have
meant lower tax. bills, morejobs,
and slowing of suburbia's creep
fromB urlington.
I ronically, they say - call this
political carping if you want -
the city would have had more of
two things B ernie and the
Progressives touted as goals: en-
vironmental protection, and a
lessening of the residential tax
burden.
"Iwould argue that very, very
strongly," said lawyer and
Democrat R ick Sharp. I f you
believe Sharp, B ernie and the
Progressives have been more
talk than action. "A lot of what
they had said was right, but
when they tried to transfer it
into policy, itjust wasn't there."
Maurice Mahoney, a Demo-
cratic city councilman, also ac-
cused Sanders of not always fol-
lowing up on his impassioned
rhetoric. Mahoney said his party
would have more effectively ac-
complished another of Sanders'
cherished goals: public housing
Michael Ziegler DMD, Family Dentistry
Community Lutheran

Church Services
1340WUllSfON R OAD, SO. B UR I lN GTON GoodFriday
Patient centered care and community service.
March 29th 7,30pm
We acceI i insurance and medicaid.
T itle:1H av<&mT "",

T ",. lJtbmns 4: 14-16


863-0505
1560 Williston R oad
"1Qs e , ns 1! 7"~~ So. B urlington. vr
for the elderly and poor. While
the Paquette administration
built a number of such projects,
Mahoney said, Sanders con-
structed none.(Technically, al-
though Mahoney failed to note
that through the private, non-
profit B urlington Community
Land Trust, Sanders provided
newhomes forhundreds of poor.)
Would the waterfront still be
making waves? Sharp argued a
park would already have been
built, instead of work only begin-
ning, had B ernie come around
earlier tothe position Sharp and
other Democrats held: that the
property was rightfully the
public's under the Public Trust
Doctrine. I nstead Sanders
wasted time playing serve-and-
volley with developers.
Things also might have been
better in Montpelier. Had
Sanders not used his mayor'sjob
as a base to run against
Madeleine Kunin for governor,
N elson said, the Democrat may
not have spent as much onsocial
programs to keep the support of
liberals and Progressives. E rgo,
today's state budget deficit may
have been smaller, and less of a
headache for R epublican Gov.
Dick Snelling.
Then there's the University of
Vermont. B urlington fought
hard to get it 200 years ago, but
the city has been fighting with it
for the last decade. Sanders and
Clavelle have been after UVM to
keep its students living (quietly)
on campus, and to kick in more
in local taxes.
DVM spokesman N ick Marro
blamed Sanders for keeping
more local students away from
the school. Lower taxes, hesaid,
would have meant lower tuition.
Similarly, he said, the school
would already have built
facilities delayed by the city. The
Sanders administration tried to
forcemore student housing tobe
constructed along with the other
projects .
Got noise problems? Without
Sanders, Marro acknowledged,
more students would be living
off campus - something Sanders
Continued on Page 28
... Beroie----------
Continued (rom Page 14
and the Progressives fought
tooth and nail. College kids
destroyed neighborhoods by
leading torent hikes and unruly
behavior, they argued.
There's also a critique of the
Sanders administration that
echoes, ironically, criticism of
George Bush's presidency -
namely, that while Sanders had
a great foreign policy (surely
none of Burlington's other
potential mayors would have
called press conferences blasting
the war inNicaragua, or urging
the eradication of Third World
hunger, as Bernie did) hewasn't
as strong at home.
TheSunKing
It's not surprising that
Sanders' political opponents,
with Bernie airbrushed out of
the picture, think Burlington
would be a healthier, happier
place right now.
On the other side, though,
Sanders' supporters are firm in
their contention that their hero
saved the city fromcertain ruin.
Their turn at playing Frank
Capra goes like this:
First, the arts. Without
Sanders, the arts scene would
certainly have lacked a vocal
champion, argued Susan Green,
head of Burlington City Arts
(formerly the Mayor's Arts
Council). Sanders started the
Mayor's Arts Council and
fostered the Discover Jazz fes-
tival, Green said. Sheadded: "He
made art thinkable for thepoor.
"At City Hall before Bernie
you could bear a pin drop," she
said. "Nobody used Contois
Auditorium - it cost too much
money. He made it 80non-
professional performers could
use it for free. It might still be
pretty much empty most of the
time."
Green added: ''Bernie himself
wasn't areal arts consumer. He
liked country music, but he
didn't show up at a lot of arts
events. The Clavelles, on the
other hand, always show up and
he always ends up dancing with
his kids."
Onamore political note, Bur-
lington would have bent over
Would natives
be living in
trailer parks,
and the Jazz Fes-
tival never have
been heard?
backwards to cater to the weal-
thy, Progressives argued. Right
nowwe'd have more high-rises,
moredepartment stores, moreof
everything commercial.
While this might have
spawned jobs, they'd be low-
paying, service ones - more
people doing the equivalent of
flipping burgers - something
Burlington already had enough
of. Gentrification would have
driven natives to scramble for
the boonies, instead of staying in
the neighborhoods they'd grown
upin.
"They would be living in
trailer parks," said Bouricius, a
Progressive who served on the
City Council the last decade.
The waterfront, in this chill-
ing Pottersville-like scenario,
would have been transformed
into something akin to Sun City
- an enclave for the elite, replete
with pricey shops and exclusive
condominiums under the Triad
Inc. plan that had city approval
before the 1981 election.
As for the neighborhoods,
downtown would have been
helped at the expense of the Old
North End, which would have
continued its decline. Sanders'
apartment inspection program
would probably never have been
instituted, giving slumlords
more breathing room.
Moreover, Bouricius argued,
taxes would have been far
higher - the rate proposed by
Paquette in his last campaign
has yet to be reached. In addi-
tion, hesaid the city would have
been "bankrupt" if Bernie hadn't
been around in 1982 to veto
plans to construct a trash-to-
energy plant.
Are Bouricius' opinions just
hasty conclusions based on
political biases? Probably. But
then so are the others. That's
what you get when you start
playing political parlor games.
Another problem with games
like this: you can keep playing
forever. We'll stop now, but if
you disagree with the scenarios
above, send us your version of
events. We'll print aselection in
an upcoming issue.

You might also like