Burlington: Take Notice!

Sam Howe Verhovek/LA Times - This big city would rather think small

For believers in a Lesser Seattle, it's been a fantastic month.

First, Seattle voters said a resounding "no" to spending public money on a new professional basketball arena, all but begging the NBA SuperSonics to leave town. Strong opposition has also emerged to the mayor's plans for a Big Dig-style tunnel project along the waterfront.

Wonderful, from the Lesser Seattle point of view. Let the word go out. Who'd ever want to live here?

"Lesser Seattle" was a term coined in the 1980s by late newspaper columnist Emmett Watson, as a puckish play on Greater Seattle Inc., the name of an early group of tourism and growth promoters. It never became a formal organization, but Lesser Seattle is nonetheless a powerful and enduring state of mind.

These Seattle residents pine for the good old days, when nobody thought of Seattle as a world-class city — and, not coincidentally, when an average worker could afford a house here. The city, in their view, had no business hosting the now-infamous World Trade Organization meeting here in 1999, but nonetheless did itself proud by turning the event into a huge anti-globalization protest.

And Seattle, they say, can take or leave the mantle of being an NBA city.

"Seattle doesn't need to have a pro basketball team in order to feel special," says Chris Van Dyk, a co-founder of Citizens for More Important Things, a nonprofit group that won the anti-subsidy vote Nov. 7. "Seattle is special regardless."

These Seattle residents pine for the good old days, when nobody thought of Seattle as a world-class city — and, not coincidentally, when an average worker could afford a house here. The city, in their view, had no business hosting the now-infamous World Trade Organization meeting here in 1999, but nonetheless did itself proud by turning the event into a huge anti-globalization protest.

Plenty of people welcome growth and development. But plenty say Seattle has given up too much of its blue-collar soul in the process.

"Part of our civic makeup is this idea that being too big for your britches is a bad thing," says Knute Berger, former editor of the Seattle Weekly newspaper. "In that sense, Lesser Seattle is due for a resurgence."

Al Runte, a former University of Washington history professor and former mayoral candidate, says he detects an "enough is enough" sentiment among voters in their passage, by nearly 75%, of the initiative barring public funds for a new basketball arena.

"A city of this quality does not need to give incentives to developers," he says. "They should be paying taxpayers for the privilege of being in this city."

Once, the Seattle area seemed quietly tucked away in a corner of the map; now, of course, it's the headquarters of Microsoft, Starbucks and Amazon.com, and it remains a magnet for global talent.

City Councilman Nick Licata, a leader of both the anti-subsidies and anti-tunnel forces, says Watson's spirit is alive and well, though Licata wouldn't quite adopt Lesser Seattle as his own slogan.

"I knew Emmett; I certainly understood his concept in a visceral way," says Licata. "It's dangerous for any public official to say you're in favor of Lesser Seattle. It sounds like you're a Luddite. But there's an element of Lesser Seattle that everyone identifies with. It's more neighborhood-oriented. Less glitz, more substance."

Seattle is hardly the only place where the visions of preservationists clash with those of growth promoters. Yet even as Seattle has become known around the world for exporting software, coffee and jet airplanes, the Lesser Seattle mentality remains an important civic force.

I spent a delightful week in Seattle a year ago. Indeed, it's a friendly place; the people are unpretentious and down-to-earth. Burllington could learn a thing or two from Seattle's experience. Although no where near the size of Seattle, Burlington is a small city that would rather think big. Too big for its britches for a city of just under 40,000 inhabitants. Just look at the CEDO manipulations surrounding the Moran Plant and the Waterfront; the lump sum mega-bribes to Waterfront Video and the Mesa stores to vacate their locations so the bankrupt Cornell family can develop that property; the high-class condo and hotel developments on Battery Street; the proposed commercial renewal plans for the Church Street Marketplace to keep the consumers and tourists happy. Can we expect yet another name change for the Southern Connector: Burton Expressway, anyone? Pine Street soon to be Chocolate Boulevard? You'd think we were fucking Houston or New York City. Property tax rises in Burlington have caused many residents to re-consider remaining in Vermont's premier city. Affordable housing is a sham here. With all the new development, it's becoming a city of the 'haves' and 'have-it-alls,' leaving those with unliveable wages to fend for themselves. (Idea for a bumpersticker: "Moonlighting in Burlington/You have to, in order to survive here.") Burlington is losing its soul. And I'm not suggesting, as they do in Boulder, to keep our town 'weird,' because it's not - Burlington's just become a harder, faster-paced city, less down-home Vermont. I'd go for a "Lesser Burlington" state of mind any day.

On a personal note, I knew Sam Howe Verhovek and his family when I lived in Houston. We were members of St Stephen's Episcopal Church, an activist inner-city parish in the Montrose. Sam was based in Houston, doing the Texas and Southwest beat for the New York Times. He moved to the Northwest to cover Seattle for the Times. Still in Seattle, he's now writing for the LA Times. Too bad we don't have as good a reporter on our local (and Gannett-owned) papers.