Rutland City Mayor race: Meet the candidates

By Pearl Bellomo

RUTLAND CITY—On Tuesday, March 4, residents of Rutland City will vote on its next mayor. Will it be a second term for incumbent Michael Doenges or a first term for Rutland City Alderman Henry Heck? The Mountain Times spoke with each candidate to learn more.

Q&A with Rutland City Mayor Michael Doenges

Tell me a bit about your past two years as mayor. Why did you decide to run again?

The past two years, what I recognized after getting into the city, was that what was on the surface and was behind the scenes were two kind of different things. The city was in a bit of a rut…many, many, many years of status quo had put the city in kind of a spot where we had to dig out a little bit, and we needed to start building a foundation that would allow us to get to the next steps, whether it was policies and processes or internally, relationships with the state and other partners, relationships with our neighbors — they were all kind of in a holding pattern. And that wasn’t my plan when I started…but we really needed to create a better base first. So we did. We created this amazing base that has really allowed us to focus on what Rutland city residents want.

We want to maintain the momentum into the next two years with things like the work we’re doing on the downtown hotel, on our Tax Increment Finance District, on our roadways and sidewalks; all of the investments that we’ve made have been really well thought out, and it’s going to take some time to get us to the next step. 

Same thing goes with public safety. The initiatives we started there are working, but I need to continue to lobby in Montpelier for the bills that are going to make Rutland safer. So, in order to do that, I need to be in this seat. I need to have the support of the voters, and we need to keep working on the things that people keep asking for.

What’s the current status of the Center Street hotel project? 

[Thursday, Feb. 20] the Board approved signing the letter of intent with the Beldens to create, or to start the creation of a public, private partnership. And what this will allow us to do is make improvements in the downtown with tax dollars that the hotel will generate, and that’s fantastic because it allows us to get our infrastructure to the place where the hotel can work, and then we get a hotel out of the deal. So it’s a win-win for everybody, and it’s a great position to be in. There’s a lot of steps till the hotel gets built still, but having that letter of intent signed gets both the hotel and the city on the right track to getting this built and done. We hope to see it up and open by spring of 2027.

What about the Diamond Run Mall project? 

What we’re doing in the city is we’re trying to re-imagine the Downtown Plaza space. If you look at the Downtown Plaza, everything from Walmart all the way out to the end of Evelyn Street, there’s some real opportunity there. And we’ve got a team of what seems to be over 25 people now, concerned citizens, residents, neighbors that are all working to kind of re-envision what that space could be. 

And while we understand that it’s owned by a private landowner and they can do whatever they want with it, I think it would be short-sighted for the city to not put some effort into considering what needs to go in that space. There’s certain things that the city receives and benefits from that space, right? Walmart sells a lot of product. A lot of that product generates what we call a 1% option tax…it also brings people downtown. It also is a place where you can get necessities. So when we look at replacing it, do we want to replace it with the same thing or something a little bit different? And so those are the conversations we’re having now.

Are there ideas of how to use the old Walmart space? 

All sorts of different ideas. And I think what’s so interesting is, we did a visioning session about a month ago, and everybody went into separate rooms and wrote down ideas on paper, and we all came back together, and almost everybody had the same vision. Imagine getting off the train right in downtown Rutland, and you’re in this space that has beautiful outdoor lighting, music, a place for people to hang out downtown, shops, and apartments kind of over where the asphalt parking lot is right now, on the far side. Then over in the Walmart Space, maybe something that’s family-centric. We have everything, from making that like a pavilion space to putting another store in there. So there’s all sorts of ideas, but no one came back with, “We want another Walmart.” Everybody came back with, “Hey, here’s where the opportunity is. Let’s make this space so amazing that people want to come here.”

Do you have any reservations about either of these projects, financially or otherwise?

No. You know, we are always cautious. We’re cautious that the revenue being generated for the Tax Increment Finance District is enough to cover the needs and installation on the city spot portion, but it’s cautious optimism for sure. I think if we focus on what we need in getting something done, we’ll see success, right? Focus is very key in my administration. 

You’ve recently said it’s too early to say whether the Asa Bloomer Building Library/City Hall move is a good idea. Do you still maintain that? Are there any updates on the project?

There’s a sentiment that the decision’s already been made. It’s far from made…I think what is different for Rutland residents is for years and years, people here have said, “We want to be involved. We want to be part of the conversation. Bring us in early so we can talk about this.” So now we’re bringing them in early, and it’s an uncomfortable space because they’re so used to us bringing them in when we’re so far down the road. But this is so early stages. If it moves, it’s going to be crucial that we are moving into a place that the public would like to see it.

I, as mayor, have to balance what the city can manage from a cost standpoint and what we can manage from a debt load standpoint…If we were to rebuild the library in place with that old courthouse, we’re talking $20-$25 million. If we just repair the library as is and make it more accessible, that’s $9-$10  million, maybe $12 million at this point, just because of cost increases. Moving to another location that’s already suited and that is not in poor condition could cost less, and that’s where the discussion began. I do think it’s still very early in the process to determine where the library should go and if it should go in the Bloomer building at all.

You’ve made strides to improve Rutland Housing, such as with the Roofs Over Rutland program. How would you continue to improve Rutland’s housing and population?

So, we set a goal of 1,000 new housing units in a five-year period, and we’re one year in, and we don’t have 1,000 new units or even a quarter of that, but what we do have is a lot of interest. So that goal has generated interest, and we’ve seen more permits in our building department in Rutland City for new housing units in the past two years than we’ve seen in the previous 10. So that’s great. Then, Roofs Over Rutland brought $8 million of non-taxpayer revenue to the city to be lent out for building new units. What was interesting about that is we brought the program online, and within two months, we had $6.5 million in applications for that money. That means there was a demand waiting in the wings to get these things built. 

What we can show now on the commercial side is that we have interest, demand, and a goal. And then, on the municipal side, what we can show is that we’ve reduced permitting costs for housing units. We have instituted at the state level, but in conjunction with the city, Act 250 reform that now currently means if you build inside of what’s called the Neighborhood Development Area, which is a quarter mile around the downtown, there’s no Act 250 permit necessary for housing… we’ve removed a lot of the barriers to entry for developers to come in and build here.

The next step for the city is to hold a developer conference…. To talk about how we are making Rutland the most developable city in Vermont and allowing them to see the eight-plus ready-to-go-spaces that we have in our community where they can build 50-plus units of housing.

Alderman Heck has raised many concerns about city spending, tax increases, and the general cost of living. How do you plan on making Rutland more affordable?

We absolutely know that affordability is key, and in my first term here, I’ll be real honest, we were suffering from major inflation issues that weren’t being addressed in previous budgets, and we also were dealing with the fact that we had a police force that wasn’t properly funded. So we’ve put dollars into public safety, and we put dollars into adjusting for inflation and right-sizing the budget to reality…But this year, the budget proposal that’s on the ballot is down under a 3% increase, and that’s a big deal. We heard that affordability is key. We made every effort to stick to and Rutland always has kind of been a bare minimum city. We have no frivolities in our budget. In the areas where things are a little bit more wants versus needs, we’re going to be continuing to look for efficiencies.

Some of the other things we can do is get creative with the different revenue sources that we have. One of those revenue sources is the 1% sales option tax that the voters approved in March of  2023, and that tax has generated revenue for Rutland, and in the past, we’ve used it on things that people are asking for—infrastructure, streets, and sidewalks. And the Board just approved the Capital Improvement Program, which is the program my administration put together to look at the next five to 10 years of Rutland’s needed capital, asset and improvements, assets and improvements, and gives us an outline of over $80 million worth of needs, but we’re going to be able to address those needs without increasing property taxes because we have the 1% sales tax. 

Can you outline your plans to increase Rutland’s safety?

Some of the things we’ve done already is we lobbied in Montpelier for two different bills …a retail theft bill and a vehicle break-in theft bill. The retail theft bill basically says if you commit more than a certain amount of retail thefts in a certain period of time, it treats it as a felony instead of a misdemeanor. And this is a big deal because this is what allows us to hold these bad actors accountable …That passed, and that is now law.

People have also been found rummaging through vehicles, and these vehicles were unlocked, and people were upset that the police couldn’t do anything about it, and that’s because of Vermont’s very unique trespassing laws. So there’s a new bill that also passed that says if you’re in someone’s vehicle without their permission, you can be charged.

One more thing that we did was something called the Neighborhood Stabilization Initiative, and this is using tools outside of normal policing tools, but with the Police Dept., with our Building and Zoning Dept., our Dept. of Public Works, our Rec. Dept., and our Fire Dept. to look for unsafe homes that are not just a blight in the neighborhood, but are actually problem homes in the neighborhood…And most of these problems homes have other things that are attributed to them: Somebody is being taken advantage of, there’s a vulnerable population that’s being abused, there’s drug deals going on in these houses, things like that…So when we find those situations to be true, we’re able to leverage our team to go and close down those houses and stabilize that part of the neighborhood. 

Moving forward, we’re going to continue to lobby for bills. There’s a bill in Montpelier right now that’s a gun theft bill. [Currently] if you steal a firearm, and that firearm is worth less than $900, that’s a misdemeanor charge…this bill proposes that stealing any gun is an automatic felony. And the reason that that’s so important is there’s a high likelihood that stolen guns will be used in drug sales or in the drug trade.

I’m also proposing a bill to escalate sentencing minimums for xylazine, fentanyl, and heroin. And what this bill does is it gives the judges some teeth. Right now, on all three of those drugs, if you sell those three drugs, there’s no bite.  While we understand that substance use is complex in nature, there’s no room for people to sell illegal drugs. There’s no room, no grace, no need for it. What we can do is lobby in Montpelier to change the laws so that our community is safer and that is such an important process, and we have to continue to do that.

Q&A with Rutland City Alderman Henry Heck

You have a long history of public service in Rutland, including your present role as city Alderman and prior as city clerk. What made you decide to run for mayor?

Making the run for mayor has been something I’ve had in the back of my head, even as clerk. There were always people that mentioned to me, why don’t you run? Wouldn’t you like to look at those things? So the first thing was, if I can’t be elected Alderman, I don’t think it’s going to make any sense to run for mayor. So when I became a member of the Board in January, it said that people are still receptive to me being in politics and still appreciated me working for the city or the community as an Alderman. So, at that point in time, I started to put a plan together to do a mayoral run. 

You’ve raised concerns about moving City Hall and the library to the Asa Bloomer Building. Can you talk more about your reservations?

I don’t have an issue with the library moving. I don’t have an issue with potentially City Hall moving. The Asa Bloomer Building, though, for me, is a deal breaker… There’s a lot of work that needs to be done. The roof may need to be repaired; there may be mold mitigation in the basement, and one elevator was inoperable, I was told, for a year because of flooding issues…Not only is it the Asa Bloomer Building, but it’s the parking garage that [it] would be attached to…. It’s not a good investment for the taxpayers, and that is my No. 1 reason. If it was a beautiful brand-new building and everything was up to code, I’d absolutely have the opinion taking a closer look. But it’s just not a good project right now for the city.

What are your thoughts on the Diamond Run Mall project? 

I know economically, we would like to see a retail business go in there to help generate that 1% local option tax …Walmart is probably one of the No. 1 contributors to that local option, and that’s a significant amount of money…Bricksmore still owns the entire plaza, is my understanding, and we need to reach out to them and work with them as a partner, which I think we’ve done in the past, and see what there are for options. You know, I continually hear movie theater, movie theater, movie theater. Is that an option? That space right now is pretty significant, so it might be able to be broken down into more than a single entity. It could be broken down into small, little incubator-type things for job creation. I think we need to look at every option that’s out there and do what’s going to be best for the community, for the city, and for the taxpayers.

What about the hotel project? Do you support it, or do you have hesitations as well?

So the hotel project is very interesting…There are a lot of “ifs” within that letter of intent. So there’s a ton of moving pieces for this, the TIF, the tax stabilization, the ask for the city’s involvement, what they will do, and at some point, I truly believe there will be an ask to the taxpayers. I don’t think the TIF districting can pay for all the infrastructure type of improvements that need to happen. 

There’s two pieces to that. There’s the underground piece that the hotel needs and has to have—infrastructure, water and sewer separation, utilities being buried, etc. Now I’ve heard that could be either just north or south of $4 million for that specific piece. And what will the TIF districting give us to do that? I don’t think it’s going to cover the whole basis. And then there’s also the Center Street marketplace project… they’re maybe turning it into a one-way, bumping out the availability for restaurants or business people to utilize some of Center Street. So there’s a lot of options, and it’s unfortunate that some of them are unknown. Right now, we have to do something in order to start the project. Or the old saying goes, you eat an elephant one bite at a time. You gotta take that first bite in order to get in there.

How do you plan on making Rutland more affordable?

Well, I can’t do it myself. You know, we can have plans. Mike can have the greatest plans out there. It’s a matter of whether it can come to fruition.

I’ve been looking at this as kind of like the chicken and egg question. Which came first? What comes first? Public safety is a huge piece. If people don’t feel safe, they may not come here to invest in their city. But at the same time, there’s an affordability piece. How do we make the state of Vermont, Rutland, specifically, more affordable? It boils down to jobs, jobs, and jobs. And not just $15 an hour jobs, we need $30 an hour jobs here…I still believe in progress and in investing in our community. I’m not going to not invest in a community or cut, cut, cut…but one of the bigger issues for me is the long term.

I think it’s a multi-pronged attack that we need to look at. We need to support our public safety people. We need to get legislative changes, and we need to make our streets and neighborhoods safer. We need to have investors who want to come here and invest in homes or in businesses. But we also need to look at bringing higher paying jobs. And whether it’s 100 jobs or even one job… It’s going to take a lot of combinations of a lot of different things to create the perfect storm to really get to move the needle.

How do you plan on rebuilding trust with the community following your recent controversial statements towards police and an alleged breach of confidentiality?

I met with the police commission. I’ve spoken with the commission chair a couple times. I’ve reached out to officers that have made statements. So, I’m in the process of doing what I can to mend or at least let those folks know I’ve always supported the police. There’s nothing there. There’s no one that can disprove that I have not supported the police. There’s various functions I’ve been to. There’s things that I’ve done during Covid, when I worked as a city clerk. I was right there for those people from day one and the so-called breach…there was no breach of executive session. I think that was pointed out by Chief Kilcullen. Again, there was no discussion of executive session-type things, as far as that goes… I’m looking forward to working with the police dept. and making sure that those people, those officers, get the necessary tools to do the best job and to really fight for them in Montpelier. 

How do you plan on improving Rutland’s housing, how do you think it’s been handled under the present mayorship? 

I know Mike has pretty big initiatives, pretty big plans. He’s more vocal…I worked very closely with the Louras administration and probably even closer with the Allaire administration. The city has X amount of tools that it can help with development and those kinds of things. And I think both of those prior administrations were very open if someone came and they had ideas about how to promote housing or promote jobs or businesses. 

I don’t think Mike’s the first guy to take that on. He’s a little bit more vocal about it, whereas the others were focusing on the items that they did; if there was a public safety piece, that’s what they did.

Chris Louras helped bring forth Project Vision, which has turned into a model throughout the entire state of Vermont. Jim Baker, who was part of that process, I’ve been in contact with Jim and looking to get together and have a dialogue about where Project Vision is today compared to where it was post-Covid or pre-Covid because the dynamics have changed. And I don’t care what anyone says: Covid changed the dynamics of how our world is, whether it’s people just staying at home, working from their homes, businesses closing down, not doing whatever …people have noted that. 

I heard the number could be 1,000 units within Rutland County that are just waiting to be rehabbed. It doesn’t have to be a state-funded or a federally-funded type of project.

Is there anything else you want to add?

One of my greatest pleasures and pride was being a city clerk and running city elections for my community. Presidential elections, the first one I came in for was the Obama election. It was a record-setting election for our city. I think there was a 70% turnout, which is 7,000 people. But for whatever reason, the March mayoral election has always been kind of , I don’t want to say the “red-headed stepchild,” but it’s just for some reason harder to get people out.

People want to be heard, to be represented. People don’t like what’s going on with the current leadership. People don’t like the fact there’s no fireworks, or there wasn’t enough representation for the road diet, or that local sports teams want to have an escort in or out of the city. I don’t think that’s asking too much, but we need to get people out to vote. 

Be informed and hopefully, we’ll see a lot of people at the polls on March 4.

The candidates have had their say. Now, it’s up to the voters of Rutland City to have theirs. Rutland City’s Town Meeting day is on Tuesday, March 4.