Outsider in the White House by Bernie Sanders, Huck Gutman Page A

perhaps the best-known radical author in America, spoke to a full house in City Hall. Studs Terkel visited us during a Workers’ Rights celebration. Abbie Hoffman, Dave Dellinger, and I spoke on a panel in what turned out to be a very amusing evening. Ella Fitzgerald showcased a jazz festival. Burlington was becoming one of the most exciting and culturally alive small cities in the country.
    These brief descriptions of the councils’ work imply that implementation of their programs was a breeze. But the creation of the councils was a major political struggle, complete with blood, sweat, and tears. Almost every funding request was accompanied by vituperative and vicious debate. Everything was partisan. Nothing came easy.
    I remember a letter to the editor written by an older man that said: “I don’t know anything about this socialism, but Sanders is doing a good job repaving the streets.” My administration never lost sight of the fact that, while broadening the scope of city government and developing new policy were important and satisfying, we could never forget about taking care of the basics. And in this area, we out-Republicaned the Republicans.
    We expanded and improved the Police Department, and began the process of paying our officers a living wage. Ironically, one of my major allies in improving the Police Department was Tony Pomerleau, the chairman of the Police Commission and one of the wealthiest people in the state. (It was Tony’s disastrous high-rise condominium waterfront development project that I had campaigned against in 1981.) Tony became such a good ally on police matters that he lost the support of the Democrats and Republicans and had to be reappointed with Progressive votes.
    We upgraded the very expensive and life-saving trucks and apparatus used by the Fire Department. We merged the Street and Water Departments, and created a much more efficient Public Works Department, with new and more capable leadership. We developed and implemented a major street repaving program. We purchased an entirely new fleet of snow removal vehicles, and developed a new and more effective snow removal plan. And we brought in competent managers to run the city departments.
    We instituted the largest and most costly environmental improvement program in the state’s history: a $52 million city-state-federal project to rebuild our sewer system, upgrade our wastewater plants, and stop the pollution of Lake Champlain. We shut down the environmentally unsound landfill, and killed a proposed trash-burning plan that would have been both an environmental and fiscal catastrophe.
    We initiated an extensive waterfront beautification plan. The previous mayor had supported a disastrous high-rise condominium project for the downtown waterfront. After an enormous amount of public discussion and fierce debate, we ended up with a very successful people-oriented waterfront of public parks, a nine-mile bike path, and a community boathouse. Today, cyclists can travel from one end of Burlington to the other. Swimming is free of charge at any one of four public parks. We’ve got some nice athletic facilities as well.
    We also developed some very innovative concepts in affordable housing. Against opposition from a segment of the local real estate industry, we became the first city in America to fund community land-trust housing. Through the Burlington Community Land Trust, working-class people were able to purchase their own homes at a lower cost than offered on the commercial market. The housing remains affordable in perpetuity because the owners must agree not to resell the property at market rates, accepting only a reasonable and limited return on their investment.
    Working with a tenant organization and nonprofit housing groups, we prevented the largest subsidized housing development in the state, Northgate, from being converted into expensive condominiums. With a federal grant secured by Senator Leahy, and other