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The Abundance Agenda - Gabe Lajeunesse · Aired Out

1:12
Speaker 1: A right, good morning, gang, Welcome to the Aired Out podcast.
2:49
Speaker 1: It is a brand new, shiny day of The wind
2:53
Speaker 1: is whipping. It's whipping, and I'm going to start out
2:58
Speaker 1: this morning by saying, be positive. Trying to be positive.
3:03
Speaker 1: It's what I'm saying to myself because I just spent
3:07
Speaker 1: a gazillion dollars on a you know, those portable car ports,
3:16
Speaker 1: and been struggling putting this thing together since Saturday. Finished
3:23
Speaker 1: late last night out there with the ladder in the headlamp,
3:26
Speaker 1: putting it all together. What do you think I woke
3:30
Speaker 1: up to this morning? Mangled mess, steel pipes splintered, broken
3:43
Speaker 1: from the wind. What are you gonna do? What are
3:46
Speaker 1: you gonna do? At least nobody got hurt but Murphy's
3:51
Speaker 1: Law right alive and well. This morning. I have a
3:57
Speaker 1: gentleman who is sitting right next to me, gayblodgin Us,
4:00
Speaker 1: who I just met just a short time ago. Man,
4:03
Speaker 1: it is an absolute pleasure to meet you.
4:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's great to be here. Thanks so much.
4:08
Speaker 1: I'm so glad to have you in here. Kind of
4:12
Speaker 1: met you by phone not too long ago. You are
4:17
Speaker 1: a local guy. You've started your own podcast, The Abundance
4:20
Speaker 1: Agenda please tell me a little bit about about you,
4:28
Speaker 1: who you are, what you do. The abundance agenda is
4:31
Speaker 1: kind of a political concept, if you will, am I right.
4:38
Speaker 2: Well, it's policy, yeah, for sure. I mean, you know,
4:42
Speaker 2: really it starts on in housing as a passion of mine.
4:46
Speaker 2: I think we all know we're in a housing crisis.
4:49
Speaker 3: You know.
4:49
Speaker 2: I started a small development firm based out of Montpelier
4:53
Speaker 2: Acre Development in twenty twenty one, and we're trying to
4:56
Speaker 2: you know, do some smart growth, trying to get some infield,
4:58
Speaker 2: trying to get some housing into the community. And there's
5:03
Speaker 2: just a lot of our debates right now. You look
5:05
Speaker 2: at just across the spectrum, whether we're talking about schools,
5:08
Speaker 2: whether we're talking about hospitals. Right, it's all about affordability,
5:12
Speaker 2: and they're all connected, right, It's all this you know,
5:14
Speaker 2: giant cycle and housing is a big part of it.
5:17
Speaker 2: And really, you know, the abundance of the idea for
5:19
Speaker 2: the abundance agenda. There were a couple of things that happened.
5:21
Speaker 2: One Vermont Futures project, which is you know, sort of
5:25
Speaker 2: an outgrowth of the Vermont Chamber of Commerce. They've been
5:28
Speaker 2: looking for a long long time at you know, how
5:31
Speaker 2: Vermont can be sustainable how we deal with the fact
5:34
Speaker 2: that we're losing young people. Right, So they've been looking
5:37
Speaker 2: at for a while, but they put out an economic
5:39
Speaker 2: policy study at the beginning of the year where they
5:44
Speaker 2: sort of outlined, like, this is what it's going to
5:47
Speaker 2: take for us to work through the challenges we have,
5:49
Speaker 2: and they couched it in terms of we have a
5:51
Speaker 2: choice between scarcity, like we tighten our belts, we don't
5:55
Speaker 2: spend money, like we just you know, ratchet things down
5:58
Speaker 2: and maybe we can balance our budget that way, or abundance, right,
6:01
Speaker 2: And the idea of abundance is that we need to
6:03
Speaker 2: invest and we need to spend money. And what they show,
6:05
Speaker 2: it's just data, but what they show is that jad
6:09
Speaker 2: we need to you know, over two hundred thousand working
6:12
Speaker 2: age adults to move to Vermont over the next twenty
6:14
Speaker 2: years if we want to be fiscally.
6:16
Speaker 1: Solvent or what And if we don't, well, if.
6:19
Speaker 2: We don't, our schools are going to close, our hospitals
6:21
Speaker 2: are going to close. We just are not going to
6:22
Speaker 2: have the lifestyle that we have. We're not going to
6:25
Speaker 2: have the same quality of life that we have today,
6:27
Speaker 2: and it will degrade over time. Right, we just can't
6:29
Speaker 2: afford what we've built.
6:31
Speaker 1: Man, Today is November fourth, and it was not necessarily
6:36
Speaker 1: with design to have you on today, but today's election
6:39
Speaker 1: day and Vermont Central Vermont right here, Barry Granite City
6:44
Speaker 1: is going to be voting on some really important things. Here.
6:47
Speaker 1: Pols have been open since seven o'clock this morning. There's
6:50
Speaker 1: been some some early balloting, but we're going to be
6:54
Speaker 1: voting today on some really important things, not just housing
7:00
Speaker 1: seminary Street article one. I'm sure you're familiar with that
7:06
Speaker 1: of this new housing development. I think you had Tom
7:10
Speaker 1: Loson on not too long ago talking about that.
7:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think Barry's doing a lot of
7:14
Speaker 2: really impressive things. And the votes today certainly are. This
7:17
Speaker 2: is what the discussion is about, right, It's like and
7:20
Speaker 2: the bottom line is what Vermont Futures showed is that
7:23
Speaker 2: we just can't I'm a fiscal conservative, but we just
7:26
Speaker 2: can't cut our way to where we need to be.
7:29
Speaker 2: So if you want to talk about the elections for
7:31
Speaker 2: a second, I mean you think about bonds. I've heard
7:34
Speaker 2: people that are against the proposals that are being put
7:37
Speaker 2: on the ballot today. We can't afford it. Well, Gadie.
7:41
Speaker 2: That's not the way bonds work, right, bonds work. There's
7:45
Speaker 2: you know, Vermont has a really high credit rating, right,
7:47
Speaker 2: double a credit rating. If we're going to be able
7:49
Speaker 2: to issue a bond, it means that we've got cash flow.
7:52
Speaker 2: We can demonstrate to underwriters who are you know, professional
7:56
Speaker 2: and underwrite these bonds all across the country, that we're
7:59
Speaker 2: going to be able to pay for this whatever it is,
8:01
Speaker 2: the school, the housing project, whatever it is, that there
8:05
Speaker 2: is sufficient cash flow to back this thing up. And
8:09
Speaker 2: so the idea that we can't afford it, that's not
8:10
Speaker 2: I mean, there's no Look, if a bond can be issued,
8:13
Speaker 2: you can afford it, right Like, it's a very solid investment, right.
8:16
Speaker 2: So it's not about that. It's about what do we
8:19
Speaker 2: want to be And this is again do we want
8:21
Speaker 2: to tighten our belts? But the issue is we cannot
8:23
Speaker 2: cut our way. You just can't keep cutting services. You're
8:27
Speaker 2: just gonna end up with, you know, an unaffordable place
8:30
Speaker 2: to live. And so it's going to be what you
8:32
Speaker 2: see in some places. You know, we lived in California
8:34
Speaker 2: time at one point, and you had basically like all
8:37
Speaker 2: the working population had to kind of commute into this
8:39
Speaker 2: area and it was just a bunch of wealthy people.
8:42
Speaker 2: You get a lot of second third homeowners. Right, the
8:44
Speaker 2: stoves can survive. You know what happens to the Johnson's
8:48
Speaker 2: of Vermont?
8:49
Speaker 1: Right?
8:49
Speaker 2: Do they exist in the future if we can't figure
8:51
Speaker 2: this out.
8:53
Speaker 1: Dave Horner just wrote, good morning, Please remember to vote.
8:58
Speaker 1: So here's the deal, and I think you you would
9:00
Speaker 1: support this. And this is something that I've been banging
9:04
Speaker 1: for years. Is no matter how you feel, exercise your
9:10
Speaker 1: your due diligence, exercise your the great privilege that you
9:17
Speaker 1: have to weigh your opinion and to vote. You know,
9:21
Speaker 1: I was explaining to my eleven year old little girl
9:23
Speaker 1: this morning. Yeah, dad, I already know. I mean I
9:28
Speaker 1: heard that, but that there's countries where you you're they
9:33
Speaker 1: don't give a damn how you feel. There's no voting. Yeah,
9:38
Speaker 1: you have the ability to know what a blessing? Right,
9:41
Speaker 1: what a blessing? I mean, really stop and think about
9:44
Speaker 1: that that. Don't take that for granted. Go up to
9:48
Speaker 1: the auditorium today and vote. You got till seven o'clock tonight,
9:51
Speaker 1: no bullshit, no excuses. Do it if you haven't done
9:55
Speaker 1: it already.
9:58
Speaker 2: I you know, it's really important, I think, and a
10:00
Speaker 2: lot of these uh, you know, these debates that you
10:03
Speaker 2: have about what we should do. You have a handful
10:06
Speaker 2: of people that are very active in their communities and
10:09
Speaker 2: they show up at all the hearings, right, and so
10:11
Speaker 2: you have like the squeaky wheel are the are the
10:14
Speaker 2: folks that like just love the stuff and they show up,
10:17
Speaker 2: but they could they could misrepresent what the actual view is, right,
10:20
Speaker 2: and and so then it's this is where we get
10:23
Speaker 2: to decide, you know, Tiff. You know, if you look
10:25
Speaker 2: at tax increment finance, which is you know, how you're
10:27
Speaker 2: going to take care of a lot of these housing projects, right,
10:30
Speaker 2: it's going to be future tax revenues is gonna come
10:32
Speaker 2: back and pay for where you're at. They overwhelmingly pass
10:36
Speaker 2: in the state of Vermont right to to to, you know,
10:38
Speaker 2: to to two out of three voters will vote generally
10:42
Speaker 2: for they get it right, they understand. But the moment
10:44
Speaker 2: that we decide to not show up and vote, it's
10:46
Speaker 2: like that again, those people that are active partisans, right,
10:50
Speaker 2: they're gonna win the day. And so we need to
10:52
Speaker 2: show up. We need to show up to those critical
10:53
Speaker 2: city council. It's hard right city council meetings. Man, they could, right,
10:57
Speaker 2: they could be so long.
10:58
Speaker 4: Right.
10:59
Speaker 2: But if if there's a one where the big vote
11:01
Speaker 2: you don't show up and the city council only hears
11:04
Speaker 2: from the people that are against something, you know, they
11:06
Speaker 2: never hear the other side of it, right, So voting
11:09
Speaker 2: like this is how we all get to come out
11:10
Speaker 2: and say no, we believe in this, we want to
11:11
Speaker 2: see more housing.
11:12
Speaker 1: Thought, brace yourself, folks, because we're going to talk about
11:15
Speaker 1: the proposed central from our Career Center as well. Coming
11:18
Speaker 1: up in just a little bit, but Seminary Street thirty
11:20
Speaker 1: one flood resilient affordable housing units developed by Downstreet Housing.
11:27
Speaker 1: Downstreet is also a new supporting sponsor of the Air
11:31
Speaker 1: Now podcast, and a lot of people have lots of
11:35
Speaker 1: great opinions about Downstreet and some not so much. But
11:41
Speaker 1: I mean, listen, they're doing great things. Man, Look at
11:45
Speaker 1: Fox Run. I mean they're doing amazing things. You know
11:49
Speaker 1: about Sporanza, the Speranza in there, the old quality in
11:53
Speaker 1: right down the road here. Yeah, what they're do, what
11:55
Speaker 1: they're doing with that, Yeah.
11:57
Speaker 2: I mean it's they're an amazing organization. Right. We all
11:59
Speaker 2: need need, we all need affordable housing. We're so grateful
12:03
Speaker 2: for Andy Harbin and the good work that they're doing
12:05
Speaker 2: over there. And I'm grateful, you know, I look at
12:08
Speaker 2: Barry in particular, like the dollar lot sales, you know,
12:12
Speaker 2: I mean, that's some aggressive It's tough. Mottpielier's got one
12:14
Speaker 2: going on right now. They got a one dollar proposal
12:17
Speaker 2: for country Club Road that we hope we get a
12:19
Speaker 2: bunch of qualified applicants that show some interest in that.
12:21
Speaker 2: But wows. It takes, you know, forward thinking city leadership
12:27
Speaker 2: to go and say, look, we're gonna we don't need
12:29
Speaker 2: to make a profit on this thing. We need to
12:30
Speaker 2: create housing now. We need all kinds of housing, and
12:33
Speaker 2: so affordable housing is one component. There's only you know,
12:36
Speaker 2: so those things are a lot of the money for
12:39
Speaker 2: that comes through tax credits, and there's only so much
12:41
Speaker 2: of that that comes around each year. It can't solve
12:43
Speaker 2: all of our housing needs. And we need we need
12:45
Speaker 2: all kinds of housing, right market rate housing, we need
12:49
Speaker 2: luxury housing. You know, you go talk to the hospital,
12:51
Speaker 2: they'll tell you they have doctors to come out and
12:53
Speaker 2: take a look around. They don't they don't find a
12:54
Speaker 2: place they want to live. They don't find a community
12:56
Speaker 2: they feel comfortable living in. They don't take jobs out here. Right,
13:00
Speaker 2: why do we have all the visiting nurses people come up?
13:02
Speaker 2: Take a look, They're like, we can't find housing that
13:04
Speaker 2: we in, a place that we want to live that
13:06
Speaker 2: we feel like is affordable. Those are not people that
13:08
Speaker 2: are going to live in downstreet projects, but they need
13:10
Speaker 2: to live somewhere, right, And so where are they? I know,
13:12
Speaker 2: you get another great sponsor with effectos. I see them
13:15
Speaker 2: on your stuff, all right, I mean they're you know,
13:17
Speaker 2: Beckley Hill. I mean these guys, you got people that
13:19
Speaker 2: are providing housing. But there's a lot of room for
13:21
Speaker 2: a lot of people to get involved in this. And
13:23
Speaker 2: it is it is a crisis.
13:25
Speaker 1: Isn't it amazing? The the the tentacles of of all
13:29
Speaker 1: of this, the rabbit holes that that we can go down.
13:32
Speaker 1: How everything is related, like you alluded to earlier, there's
13:36
Speaker 1: mental health, there's there's housing, there's affordability, there's the economy,
13:40
Speaker 1: there's uh, there's mental health, there's drug use, there's homelessness.
13:44
Speaker 1: I mean, everything is connected here.
13:48
Speaker 4: And.
13:51
Speaker 1: What's the hub? What's the hub of it? It's we
13:55
Speaker 1: all have different opinions.
13:56
Speaker 2: But I think almost everybody is saying housing is the key.
13:59
Speaker 2: Like if you go to to you know, if you
14:00
Speaker 2: look at the work by the Green Mountain Careboard to
14:03
Speaker 2: look at the potential for closures of hospitals, you know,
14:07
Speaker 2: their research and they brought in a consultant who does
14:10
Speaker 2: this all over the country. Right, But it was basically housing, Like,
14:12
Speaker 2: you've got to figure out this housing piece because it's
14:15
Speaker 2: just creating this untenable, unaffordable. There's other issues. It's not
14:19
Speaker 2: the only issue, but it's that, you know, I think
14:21
Speaker 2: it's you know, the one of the most critical. But
14:24
Speaker 2: the thing about it is, so, are are you familiar
14:27
Speaker 2: with the concept of a doom loop?
14:29
Speaker 1: No?
14:29
Speaker 2: Okay, So the idea of a doom loop is that
14:31
Speaker 2: we have it's what you're describing that we have a
14:33
Speaker 2: whole bunch of factors that are all you know, they're negative,
14:39
Speaker 2: trending negative, and they're all impacting some economic factor that's
14:42
Speaker 2: trending negative is impacting another, which impacts another, and so
14:46
Speaker 2: you end up in this downward spiral. Right. And so
14:49
Speaker 2: generally we thought about doom loop, it's been associated with
14:52
Speaker 2: inner cities. Right. So if you think of like Detroit's
14:55
Speaker 2: a classic example, because they've actually turned it around. So
14:58
Speaker 2: in Detroit, you know, you have this phenomenon where it's like, oh,
15:01
Speaker 2: the streets get a little bit dangerous and the crime
15:03
Speaker 2: gets you know, challenging. And so guess what happens. Employers
15:07
Speaker 2: don't you know, they don't locate their offices there, and
15:10
Speaker 2: then what happens. Then there's no foot traffic. So then
15:13
Speaker 2: the restaurants close, right, and so the next thing you know,
15:15
Speaker 2: you got like this ghost town where nobody's at Well,
15:19
Speaker 2: that's a doom loop.
15:19
Speaker 1: How the hell did you get out of that?
15:21
Speaker 2: And so Detroit has gotten themselves out of a doom
15:24
Speaker 2: loop by it started with some big investors, some big
15:29
Speaker 2: families that have made a lot of money in that
15:31
Speaker 2: you know, from that community that reinvested. It starts with
15:33
Speaker 2: some big projects, but then other people start piling in. Yeah, right,
15:37
Speaker 2: so they say, okay, there's some really I think Barry
15:40
Speaker 2: is a great example. I saw a great presentation the
15:43
Speaker 2: Saint Albans the city manager up there, Like he he
15:47
Speaker 2: just showed the transformation that's happened there over about a
15:49
Speaker 2: decade of them strategically coming in buying little you know,
15:53
Speaker 2: seeing opportunities to redevelop certain areas, you know, making making
15:57
Speaker 2: some calculated risks, right, and now what you have in
16:00
Speaker 2: that place, it's beautiful, right, But it took a decade.
16:03
Speaker 2: And what happens is once you make those big investments
16:06
Speaker 2: is then you can have smaller developers. We need a
16:09
Speaker 2: lot of small developers to come in and stay. Say
16:11
Speaker 2: oh hey, I can convert this to like some condos.
16:14
Speaker 2: I can take this dumpy multifamily that hasn't been invested
16:18
Speaker 2: in for fifty years and frankly should probably not be
16:21
Speaker 2: you know, condoned for anybody to live in, and it's
16:23
Speaker 2: worth now investing some money into this place and turning
16:27
Speaker 2: it into something that people do want to live in
16:29
Speaker 2: and has some economic value. But that's not going to
16:32
Speaker 2: happen until you have some of these big.
16:33
Speaker 1: Moves residual uh.
16:37
Speaker 2: Spin off Yeah, right, let's reverse that doom loop.
16:41
Speaker 3: Right.
16:41
Speaker 2: It takes a lot of us, but the big moves
16:43
Speaker 2: are really important. Right. So I think again that some
16:45
Speaker 2: of the stuff that you're looking at here, you know,
16:48
Speaker 2: I don't I don't know enough about the Tech Center
16:50
Speaker 2: to really have a strong opinion on it other than
16:53
Speaker 2: to just say it is a choice. This is a
16:55
Speaker 2: choice right that we're making of investing in our future
17:00
Speaker 2: or tightening our belt. And again, the fact that there
17:02
Speaker 2: could be a bond there means that you can't afford
17:05
Speaker 2: to do it. It's not that you can't afford to
17:06
Speaker 2: do it now, whether the programs that are going to
17:08
Speaker 2: be offered there, whether I don't know anything about that.
17:10
Speaker 2: I don't know enough about to comment on it. But
17:12
Speaker 2: I just think if you create something, the concept of it,
17:16
Speaker 2: the concept of creating a place where our kids feel like,
17:19
Speaker 2: I have a future. I can get a really good
17:21
Speaker 2: paying job without getting into debt, right, I can immediately
17:24
Speaker 2: come out of school and be employable, right and contribute
17:28
Speaker 2: to a community that I really.
17:29
Speaker 1: Care about, maybe without going to college.
17:31
Speaker 2: To maybe without going to college, or maybe transitioning into
17:35
Speaker 2: an employer sponsored training program or something like that, or
17:38
Speaker 2: an apprenticeship program.
17:40
Speaker 1: Right starting my own business, starting a business, like putting
17:42
Speaker 1: down roots.
17:43
Speaker 2: If we create a pathway where these kids want to
17:46
Speaker 2: stay here, like, isn't that everything that we could want
17:49
Speaker 2: to create?
17:50
Speaker 1: So Dave just posted something here and I was just
17:53
Speaker 1: going to bring this up. Anyways, The price tag on
17:55
Speaker 1: this is one hundred and forty nine mil top to bottom. Yeah. Everything.
18:01
Speaker 1: They were originally estimating that it was going to be
18:04
Speaker 1: somewhere between one p fifty and two hundred, so they
18:08
Speaker 1: were actually delighted to see that it came in a
18:11
Speaker 1: mill less. Dave says, one hundred and forty nine million
18:16
Speaker 1: added to our taxes. And that's just the first year.
18:21
Speaker 1: It's not going to be completed until twenty twenty nine.
18:25
Speaker 1: That means more bonds each year until then, until it's done.
18:30
Speaker 1: Let's get real training back apprenticeships. We will have to
18:36
Speaker 1: pay for bis for busing too. Plus how will it
18:40
Speaker 1: work when they reconfigure the districts. So some valid concern here.
18:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think those are all. I mean
18:48
Speaker 2: that's all. But again you could you couldn't get the
18:50
Speaker 2: bond if there wasn't the money to pay for it.
18:51
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess that's my you know, there's enough
18:54
Speaker 2: money to put it together, whether it's a good investment
18:56
Speaker 2: or not. I mean, that's again, that's a different sort
18:58
Speaker 2: of conversation.
19:00
Speaker 1: The breakdown for different towns.
19:03
Speaker 2: No I have Okay, yeah, but you know the idea
19:05
Speaker 2: of the apprenticeship I think you know absolutely right, and
19:08
Speaker 2: you have seen there is a it's interesting our young
19:11
Speaker 2: people are pretty smart.
19:12
Speaker 3: You know.
19:12
Speaker 2: If you look at the student loan debt, I don't
19:15
Speaker 2: know exactly your age, but you look like you might
19:17
Speaker 2: be a gen X or might righte fifty five okay
19:20
Speaker 2: next week. So in our space, right like, we have
19:22
Speaker 2: the most student loan debt. Can you imagine that? Yeah,
19:25
Speaker 2: gen X, we still are paying down student loans like
19:28
Speaker 2: that is insane. The young guys, they're not They're not
19:32
Speaker 2: getting into a system where they're going to take out
19:33
Speaker 2: one hundred and fifty thousand dollars of student loans to
19:36
Speaker 2: get a degree in puppetry or something, right Like, it's
19:38
Speaker 2: not happening. They are, they are. It's like the apprenticeships
19:42
Speaker 2: have doubled since pre COVID, right, like the number, but
19:44
Speaker 2: we need more than that, Like, there's so many training
19:47
Speaker 2: programs that we could look at.
19:48
Speaker 1: There's between one hundred and fifty and two hundred students
19:52
Speaker 1: that are turned away every single year because of the
19:56
Speaker 1: current capacity over at the Central from my career center. Yeah,
20:01
Speaker 1: and some of them our age now right by the
20:04
Speaker 1: time their numbers up. Yeah, I mean again, it's all
20:11
Speaker 1: about the future to me.
20:12
Speaker 2: This discussion of austerity versus you know, abundance. It's what
20:16
Speaker 2: kind of future do we want to build?
20:18
Speaker 3: Right?
20:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know we're this is where we have to
20:20
Speaker 2: look to the what do we want this to look
20:22
Speaker 2: like in fifty years? And it starts with an investment
20:24
Speaker 2: we make today. All the things that we love around
20:26
Speaker 2: us JD. Everything around us that we love a previous
20:29
Speaker 2: generation built, They made decisions to invest and we get
20:33
Speaker 2: to benefit from that.
20:34
Speaker 1: Now. Yeah, you you had first of all, if you're
20:38
Speaker 1: just joining us, Gabe Loginus, he is a local businessman, investor.
20:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm a financial guy, real estate investor. Yeah, all
20:49
Speaker 2: of that.
20:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, started a podcast called The Abundance Agenda. It's on Facebook.
20:57
Speaker 1: You need to stop and go there and have a look,
21:01
Speaker 1: give a like, give a follow, thank you, and get
21:04
Speaker 1: involved with your comments and share something. It's a race
21:08
Speaker 1: or sharp niche and it's something that's really a hot
21:12
Speaker 1: button issue right now. Housing in general. You've just had
21:15
Speaker 1: Tom Lowson on not too long. Yeah, recap what he said.
21:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I was talking to all the cities
21:23
Speaker 2: around central Vermont just trying to understand what they're doing
21:25
Speaker 2: on the housing issue. And the thing that Tom really
21:28
Speaker 2: contributed was the team approach that you're seeing in Barry.
21:31
Speaker 2: Like again, we kind of talked about some of these
21:33
Speaker 2: dollar lot sales. He was talking about some of the
21:36
Speaker 2: proactive work that's going to help people recognize that maybe
21:39
Speaker 2: you could build an ADU, or maybe you could subdivide
21:41
Speaker 2: or some of these things. It's just the team approach
21:44
Speaker 2: that you have here, I think is what it's going
21:45
Speaker 2: to take to jump start some of these bigger projects
21:48
Speaker 2: like you know are being voted on today and those
21:52
Speaker 2: that will take place in the future. But it then
21:55
Speaker 2: gives people, smaller developers, smaller real estate operators confidence and investing.
22:01
Speaker 2: I mean, you had to show yesterday about why landlords
22:04
Speaker 2: are not you know, they're there, may be pulling up stakes,
22:07
Speaker 2: they're like what, you know, the is it worth reinvesting
22:10
Speaker 2: in this property at this moment in time. And again,
22:14
Speaker 2: if we want to work ourselves out of this doom loop,
22:16
Speaker 2: we got to do some of these big things. We
22:18
Speaker 2: got to see some you know, we got to have
22:19
Speaker 2: some positive energy and then we can make the choices.
22:21
Speaker 2: And so what I heard from Tom was just a
22:24
Speaker 2: very organized, you know, team led effort by the City
22:29
Speaker 2: of Barry to put housing as a major priority. Now
22:33
Speaker 2: most of the communities around recognize they have a problem.
22:35
Speaker 2: And everybody that I interviewed, they're all doing something. I
22:38
Speaker 2: would say my impression, you know, and again you'd have
22:40
Speaker 2: to go look at housing starts, you know, in retrospect,
22:44
Speaker 2: let's look back and say, hey, who had more housing starts?
22:46
Speaker 2: Who created more housing? But I would say Barry impressed
22:49
Speaker 2: me as being the most organized in their effort to
22:53
Speaker 2: address this issue. But everybody's doing something. Everybody knows they
22:56
Speaker 2: have a challenge and everybody's trying to work on it.
22:58
Speaker 1: The talents that uh don't have zoning are being creative.
23:05
Speaker 1: The family structure has has changed. Oh yeah, there's a
23:08
Speaker 1: lot of these eight us now that are popping up everywhere. Yeah.
23:14
Speaker 1: One of the subjects that you discuss in the Abundance
23:19
Speaker 1: Agenda is subdivision and what that looks like and how
23:26
Speaker 1: possible that is to be able to get a deeper
23:29
Speaker 1: look at it, whether or not it's it's the right
23:32
Speaker 1: option for you. How to make I think one of
23:35
Speaker 1: your episodes was how to make some of your your
23:39
Speaker 1: property or your backyard a revenue stream?
23:43
Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah, I mean I think if you look at
23:45
Speaker 2: the reality we're at, you know, we have one in
23:49
Speaker 2: two person households. Right, we've got you know, most of
23:52
Speaker 2: our housing stock. It is like three thousand square foot
23:55
Speaker 2: farmhouse Victorian style, like really, you know, four bedroom, five
23:58
Speaker 2: bedrooms all.
23:59
Speaker 1: Around all around here. R and Monthpillier my god, I
24:02
Speaker 1: mean it was just on College Street and Month Pilliers.
24:04
Speaker 2: Everywhere hard way. I mean you go to you driver,
24:07
Speaker 2: I mean that's what we did, you know, back in
24:08
Speaker 2: the day when the you know, when Granted was big
24:10
Speaker 2: and there was lots of railroad traffic, and right, we
24:13
Speaker 2: built these big homes. Families were different.
24:15
Speaker 1: And then during the winter we sealed off a lot
24:18
Speaker 1: of those rooms so that we didn't have to heat them. Yeah,
24:20
Speaker 1: I mean they're huge homes.
24:22
Speaker 2: So now what you have is you have a lot.
24:23
Speaker 2: It's mostly you know, baby boomers, but you got a
24:25
Speaker 2: lot of baby boomers living in kind of too much
24:27
Speaker 2: house and they have a lot of equity, right, They've
24:29
Speaker 2: got a lot of equity locked up in their real estate.
24:32
Speaker 2: And you know, really what we're just talking to people
24:35
Speaker 2: about is, hey, how can you unlock some of that equity?
24:37
Speaker 2: Do you have a double sized lot, could you subdivide?
24:41
Speaker 2: Could you partition the house? Not everybody's going to want
24:44
Speaker 2: to do that. But you know, like where I grew up,
24:46
Speaker 2: I sort of look at New Hampshire and you know,
24:48
Speaker 2: if you were to look in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, you
24:52
Speaker 2: know you went back in time when we were kids
24:54
Speaker 2: and growing up and stuff similar kind of situation. Right,
24:57
Speaker 2: lots of like houses that were really big. But as
24:59
Speaker 2: the demographics changed, what you had is a lot of
25:03
Speaker 2: a lot of these places got cut up into apartments,
25:05
Speaker 2: got cut up into condos, and frankly, it preserved a
25:09
Speaker 2: lot of really beautiful housing stock that instead of having
25:12
Speaker 2: you know, one five bedroom you know captains you know
25:15
Speaker 2: house or something. It's like, look, there's four different families
25:18
Speaker 2: that are living in this place that are all contributing
25:20
Speaker 2: to the historic upkeep of this property. It's beautiful. I
25:23
Speaker 2: mean if you've been a Portsman New Hampshire lately, but
25:25
Speaker 2: it's like it's so gorgeous. And what's happened over time
25:28
Speaker 2: is then now they have a lot of new construction, right,
25:31
Speaker 2: a lot of the industrial space or whatever developers are
25:34
Speaker 2: coming in and they're turning those into beautiful sort of
25:37
Speaker 2: luxury you know, kinds of lifestyle living. But it's created
25:41
Speaker 2: a space where now we can have all kinds. You know,
25:43
Speaker 2: we need everything, right, We need the affordable housing, We
25:45
Speaker 2: need some smaller spaces where these one and two bedroom
25:48
Speaker 2: families can live, right, and then we're going to have
25:50
Speaker 2: on the luxe end. You know, you'll have some of
25:53
Speaker 2: that as well, but without you know, the the zoning. Right,
25:57
Speaker 2: this is one of the big discussions that you have.
25:59
Speaker 2: So the other big movement towards abundance. There was a
26:01
Speaker 2: book written this. So my first introduction was the Vermont
26:05
Speaker 2: Futures Project, but in the spring there was a book
26:08
Speaker 2: written by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson of the New
26:11
Speaker 2: York Times in the Atlantic called It's Abundance is what
26:15
Speaker 2: it's called. But they basically go through and just talk
26:18
Speaker 2: about how we created an environment where housing is almost impossible, right,
26:25
Speaker 2: Like we created zoning rules, you know, we created historic protections,
26:32
Speaker 2: We created a lot of things that for at the time,
26:35
Speaker 2: there was good reason to do it. There's a lot
26:37
Speaker 2: of good reasons to do what we did. But now
26:39
Speaker 2: we've created a situation that's really difficult to work our
26:43
Speaker 2: way out of now that we have this housing crisis,
26:45
Speaker 2: and so basically the solution to that, they just point
26:47
Speaker 2: this out it's in our hands, Like we just have
26:49
Speaker 2: to decide to reform. Like getting a permit means we're
26:53
Speaker 2: giving you permission. Like, let's just make it easier for
26:56
Speaker 2: you to get a permit to do something that's going
26:59
Speaker 2: to create value and create housing and give people a
27:02
Speaker 2: place to live.
27:02
Speaker 1: Is that being done in Vermont?
27:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, people are doing it, you know, and frankly, the
27:07
Speaker 2: legislature we really should look to, you know, you know,
27:11
Speaker 2: both the governor and the legislature at you know, the
27:12
Speaker 2: Act to fifty reforms that have happened, the CHIP legislation
27:16
Speaker 2: that was passed last year. There's a lot of that.
27:18
Speaker 2: That's the Community Housing Infrastructure Program, which will similar to
27:22
Speaker 2: a tiff. It'll be like mini tiff, right, you can
27:24
Speaker 2: have future revenues can offset infrastructure, you know, projects that
27:29
Speaker 2: need to happen before you're going to see housing created.
27:31
Speaker 2: But they've sort of forced communities to say, look, everybody
27:35
Speaker 2: can build an ADU in the state of Vermont. Everybody can.
27:38
Speaker 2: It doesn't matter what your zoning says. If you want
27:40
Speaker 2: to put an accessory dwelling unit and create a space
27:43
Speaker 2: for somebody to live, you know, whether that's an in
27:45
Speaker 2: law that needs a place, or whether that's you know,
27:47
Speaker 2: just providing housing and renting something out to somebody that
27:50
Speaker 2: wouldn't have a space. Otherwise everybody can do that, and
27:52
Speaker 2: any lot with city water and sewer can have four units, right,
27:56
Speaker 2: So most of our zoning was skewed towards single family occupancy.
28:01
Speaker 2: That's what it was really written towards. It was sort
28:02
Speaker 2: of written to protect that. And the state came in
28:05
Speaker 2: and said, look, you guys can do whatever else you want,
28:07
Speaker 2: but you're going to do these things. You're going to
28:09
Speaker 2: allow accessory dwelling units. The state of California was one
28:12
Speaker 2: of the first to really go that direction. I think
28:15
Speaker 2: they passed their legislation on ADUs in like twenty twenty.
28:18
Speaker 2: Around that timeframe, ADUs are now twenty percent of all
28:23
Speaker 2: building projects in the state of California. They just needed
28:26
Speaker 2: to unlock us. They needed to create an environment where
28:29
Speaker 2: people could and frankly, if you ever look at really
28:32
Speaker 2: the best, the coolest designs of tiny homes, they're all
28:34
Speaker 2: California companies now because they've created a demand.
28:37
Speaker 1: I was going to ask about the tiny home movement
28:40
Speaker 1: and if it is still alive and well.
28:44
Speaker 2: Nationally, Yeah, I mean it's I think it takes. So
28:47
Speaker 2: the legislation is the enabler, and California did that. Yeah,
28:51
Speaker 2: and pricing, you know, like all you got to do
28:53
Speaker 2: is look at home prices in California. Know, hey, most
28:56
Speaker 2: most you know, young couples that try to move out
28:58
Speaker 2: there are not going to be able to afford to
28:59
Speaker 2: live a you know, at one point five million dollar,
29:02
Speaker 2: eight hundred score foot ranch house. That doesn't work, right,
29:06
Speaker 2: But can they live in a tiny home in somebody's backyard?
29:09
Speaker 2: Yes they can. And so to me, what it takes,
29:13
Speaker 2: I think what you see getting to this twenty percent
29:16
Speaker 2: of all building permits or eighty us. First the legislation happens,
29:19
Speaker 2: which we did a couple of years ago in Vermont.
29:22
Speaker 2: Then you have to have some people start doing it right.
29:25
Speaker 2: And so if you if you, you know, build an
29:27
Speaker 2: apartment above your garage, people, you know, probably what's gonna happen.
29:31
Speaker 2: Now it's less controversial today, but in the past, you
29:34
Speaker 2: would have had your neighbors show up and oppose you.
29:36
Speaker 2: This is what would happen. I'm just telling you. They
29:38
Speaker 2: might love you. You guys may be best friends and
29:40
Speaker 2: have barbecues, But you say, I'm gonna do this project
29:43
Speaker 2: in my backyard. Your neighbors are all gonna show up
29:44
Speaker 2: at the hearing and they're gonna be like, it's gonna
29:46
Speaker 2: create all this traffic and they're gonna run over my
29:49
Speaker 2: kids on the way to school. It's gonna create noise.
29:52
Speaker 2: Right again, now that it's of right, you're gonna have
29:54
Speaker 2: less of that. But what's gonna happen, what's actually gonna happen,
29:57
Speaker 2: is when you build that apartment above your garage, and
30:00
Speaker 2: now your mother in law lives there, right, and they
30:03
Speaker 2: meet your mother in law and they're like, she's the
30:05
Speaker 2: or whoever it does. Right, they meet the new neighbor
30:07
Speaker 2: and they love them. They're gonna start saying, hey, this
30:09
Speaker 2: isn't such a bad thing. Maybe I can do this
30:11
Speaker 2: above my garage. Yeah, maybe I can put a tiny
30:13
Speaker 2: home in my backyard. Right, And then it creates this
30:16
Speaker 2: what you're seeing in California, where the the industry will
30:18
Speaker 2: flock here because they'll be like, look, people are building
30:21
Speaker 2: these and there's a demand.
30:22
Speaker 1: Sure here in Vermont the tiny home movement. A good
30:27
Speaker 1: friend of mine, Newton Newton Wells, was like, you know,
30:32
Speaker 1: I'm jumping on this, man, I'm gonna do this newt
30:35
Speaker 1: How big is your home?
30:37
Speaker 3: Hey, good morning?
30:39
Speaker 4: Uh four hundred and thirty square feet?
30:42
Speaker 2: Oh, I love it.
30:43
Speaker 1: And it's what is it, sixteen by twenty.
30:47
Speaker 4: Yeah, sixteen by twenty, so three hundred and twenty feet
30:50
Speaker 4: square feet on the main floor and then there's another
30:52
Speaker 4: one hundred feet in the loft.
30:54
Speaker 1: All right, What made you decide to do this here
30:57
Speaker 1: in Vermont, buddy?
31:00
Speaker 4: Vermont had just barely enacted that law when I did it.
31:05
Speaker 4: I think I was the first one in my town
31:07
Speaker 4: to do it because I went to get the permit
31:09
Speaker 4: at the town at a meeting with one of the
31:11
Speaker 4: town boards, and and they had not heard of that before.
31:15
Speaker 3: So I had to bring in the law with me
31:17
Speaker 3: and explain it.
31:19
Speaker 4: But I decided to do it because, you know, with
31:22
Speaker 4: that new law, I.
31:23
Speaker 3: Was like, Wow, you know I could.
31:25
Speaker 4: I could build myself a small cabin to live in, and.
31:31
Speaker 3: You do not have to buy another lot.
31:34
Speaker 4: I did have to do a new septic and another
31:36
Speaker 4: well to meet that requirement, but you know, at least
31:41
Speaker 4: I didn't have to buy another chunk of land, which
31:44
Speaker 4: is the whole purpose of this auxiliary dwelling law. It
31:48
Speaker 4: enables people to build another dwelling on a lot that
31:53
Speaker 4: otherwise would only contain one dwelling because you know, a
31:57
Speaker 4: lot of towns have two acres zoning. Some them have
32:00
Speaker 4: different requirements, but you know, in my town it's two
32:03
Speaker 4: acre zoning, and so it's one house on the two
32:06
Speaker 4: acre lot. And so the the auxiliary dwelling lot enables
32:10
Speaker 4: people to have the one house plus the auxiliary dwelling,
32:14
Speaker 4: which can be in a separate building.
32:16
Speaker 3: It doesn't have to be an apartment within the main building.
32:20
Speaker 1: What's your uh, what's your your your heating costs? Here? Utilities?
32:25
Speaker 3: Oh, the utilities are almost nothing.
32:27
Speaker 4: I mean we we did this with I built this
32:30
Speaker 4: house in like oh.
32:32
Speaker 3: Nine and it it I.
32:35
Speaker 4: Remember ordering the wall and ceiling panels. It's a timber
32:39
Speaker 4: frame with with superinsulated panel.
32:42
Speaker 1: Walls stress skin, right, yeah, I.
32:45
Speaker 3: Think that's another term for them.
32:46
Speaker 4: And and so I ordered it at the at the
32:51
Speaker 4: time when gas had just for the first time gone
32:55
Speaker 4: to over four dollars a gallon, and I figured, well,
33:00
Speaker 4: you know, if this is the future of buying fuel,
33:04
Speaker 4: I want to spend a little extra money on really
33:08
Speaker 4: good insulation. So I've got I've got I think if
33:11
Speaker 4: I remember correctly. The walls are eight inch thick polystyrene
33:18
Speaker 4: and the ceiling is twelve inch polystyrene. So in in
33:26
Speaker 4: in a year, I might burn through two hundred gallons
33:31
Speaker 4: of propane. And that runs the radiant floors in the
33:35
Speaker 4: basement and the main floor, and it runs the propane
33:40
Speaker 4: for the range and the water heater.
33:43
Speaker 1: And you rigged up a solar panel too.
33:48
Speaker 4: Yeah, we've got a solar panel out back.
33:51
Speaker 3: The solar panel is uh, you know, it's funny.
33:54
Speaker 4: I just recently did the math on the solar panel
33:56
Speaker 4: and the payback on those is a whole lot longer
34:00
Speaker 4: than what was promoted at the time.
34:05
Speaker 3: Given the opportunity to do that again, I don't think
34:08
Speaker 3: I would, But.
34:11
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, it's like a lot of this stuff
34:13
Speaker 4: that gets promoted as really highly efficient.
34:16
Speaker 3: Like heat pumps and things. You know.
34:20
Speaker 4: I put heat pumps in a three bedroom house that
34:25
Speaker 4: I rent out, and.
34:29
Speaker 3: That the system went in and the.
34:34
Speaker 4: First January and February that I ran it. By the
34:36
Speaker 4: end of January, I got a letter from the Morristown
34:42
Speaker 4: Water and Light that said, if you consume this much
34:45
Speaker 4: electricity again next month, we're going to put you in
34:47
Speaker 4: commercial rates and your electric rates will triple. So you know,
34:56
Speaker 4: I had to stop running the heat pumps in the winter.
35:00
Speaker 3: We took the controls off the listen.
35:02
Speaker 1: I think you recognize that not everybody can can do this.
35:07
Speaker 1: You don't have any kids, You have a very very
35:12
Speaker 1: very small family. But are you hopeful that vermont is
35:18
Speaker 1: is going to get more on this wave of the
35:22
Speaker 1: of the tiny home movement? I note that there's there's
35:26
Speaker 1: pods and and things being built. What in Chittenden County?
35:31
Speaker 1: Am I right?
35:33
Speaker 4: Yeah? I mean I think the pods in Chittenden County
35:36
Speaker 4: are these little manufactured things that the city has erected
35:39
Speaker 4: on a parking lot for like transitional housing from homeless people,
35:45
Speaker 4: for homeless people to have a more stable place before
35:48
Speaker 4: they get into a regular apartment or something. But but yeah,
35:54
Speaker 4: I mean many homes are great. I think what what
36:00
Speaker 4: Morristown did after I built my house?
36:03
Speaker 3: They changed the law.
36:04
Speaker 4: So the state law says that the town has to
36:07
Speaker 4: allow it, and has to allow up to thirty percent
36:10
Speaker 4: the size of the main house to which the auxiliary
36:13
Speaker 4: dwelling is subordinate, but the town to have the right.
36:21
Speaker 4: The state law gives each town the right to adjust
36:25
Speaker 4: those laws make them laxer if they want to so
36:28
Speaker 4: that so that if.
36:29
Speaker 3: They want to allow a larger auxiliary dwelling.
36:32
Speaker 4: Then they can do so. And the last time I've checked,
36:35
Speaker 4: which was, you know, a couple of years ago, a
36:37
Speaker 4: few years ago, the town had changed it so that
36:43
Speaker 4: I could I could have built my house, my auxiliary
36:47
Speaker 4: dwelling twice as big as I did. But of course
36:51
Speaker 4: that you know, it's not it.
36:54
Speaker 3: I could. I could change it now, but I'd have to.
36:56
Speaker 4: I'd have to do all kinds of work to you know,
36:58
Speaker 4: double the size of the build.
37:00
Speaker 3: It would not be easy. But so, I mean that's good.
37:04
Speaker 4: And I think that auxiliary dwellings are are great as
37:08
Speaker 4: long as they can be a little bigger than what
37:12
Speaker 4: I built. I mean, what I built is fantastic, but
37:15
Speaker 4: it's a little tight, you know.
37:17
Speaker 3: I mean I think, uh, you know.
37:19
Speaker 4: Had I had the opportunity, I would have made it
37:21
Speaker 4: a little bigger than I did.
37:23
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, having a mud room would have been great.
37:28
Speaker 4: Having a kitchen that's a little bigger would have been
37:30
Speaker 4: really fantastic. And even having room for a dining room
37:33
Speaker 4: table instead of just a kitchen countertop with stools would
37:36
Speaker 4: be would be really nice too.
37:38
Speaker 3: People just too.
37:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean I think this is you know,
37:45
Speaker 2: this is a thanks for the callin I you know
37:49
Speaker 2: what you hear from in the downsizing discussion, which is
37:53
Speaker 2: part of this how do to you unlock equity? There
37:56
Speaker 2: are people who would move out of their main house
37:59
Speaker 2: and move into an eighty, but they don't want to
38:00
Speaker 2: move into that four hundred square foot kind of situation
38:04
Speaker 2: because of those things that were just described right that
38:06
Speaker 2: they'd like something that you know, is suitable for them.
38:10
Speaker 2: So it's maybe going to be more like eight hundred
38:11
Speaker 2: square feet. And again the ADU law will allow that.
38:15
Speaker 2: It depends on the size of the primary home. But
38:17
Speaker 2: that's I think that there are some issues like is
38:19
Speaker 2: four hundred square feet going to be enough for everybody?
38:22
Speaker 4: You know?
38:22
Speaker 2: Maybe not, but it is. It is an option, right.
38:24
Speaker 2: I think having a whole ecosystem of housing is important.
38:28
Speaker 4: Yea, it is. But the one problem with the ADU
38:32
Speaker 4: thing is that you're building a much smaller dwelling and
38:36
Speaker 4: the fixed costs of site work, steptic, well, concrete, all
38:44
Speaker 4: of that is pretty much the same.
38:47
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's true, you.
38:49
Speaker 4: Know, regardless of whether it's four hundred eight hundred or
38:53
Speaker 4: fifteen hundred square feet, so you know, the cost for
38:59
Speaker 4: square foot increases dramatically when you build a really small
39:02
Speaker 4: auxiliary dwelling. So I mean, I think these laws are
39:06
Speaker 4: changing for a reason, and and that's a good thing.
39:11
Speaker 4: They're they're making the state and the different towns are
39:14
Speaker 4: making it easier for people to build larger auxiliary dwellings,
39:18
Speaker 4: which really I think is the solution. Yeah, because of.
39:22
Speaker 3: The cost aspect and the practicality aspect.
39:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, yep, thanks new thank you.
39:31
Speaker 4: You know, I've always been a big proponent of all
39:33
Speaker 4: of these things, but you know, having done it, having
39:36
Speaker 4: done the heat pumps and the solar panels and the
39:38
Speaker 4: and the auxiliary dwelling, these are things that I would
39:42
Speaker 4: the points I mentioned are things that I would I
39:46
Speaker 4: would really reconsider, uh having done it all.
39:50
Speaker 1: Once interesting stuff. You know this and and this this home.
39:59
Speaker 4: Uh.
40:00
Speaker 1: I would love to show it to you, Gabe, if
40:03
Speaker 1: we ever have time to grab a cup of coffee
40:05
Speaker 1: and run up there. Man, you just wouldn't believe it.
40:08
Speaker 1: It's just absolutely beautiful, beautiful. And I note that that
40:15
Speaker 1: there was some discussion about Barry having some tiny homes.
40:21
Speaker 1: I think Tom Loson even had a couple of them
40:25
Speaker 1: built not too long ago.
40:27
Speaker 2: I didn't know that. Yeah, I mean there's a couple
40:31
Speaker 2: of things with it too, you know, the so accessory
40:36
Speaker 2: dwelling unit laws with those allow there's another issue of
40:40
Speaker 2: like when we think about the tiny home movement, if
40:42
Speaker 2: you went out and just google tiny homes and you
40:44
Speaker 2: were looking to buy something, and you want to have
40:46
Speaker 2: to hire a contractor to build something, you have to
40:49
Speaker 2: really look at your local laws because a lot of
40:52
Speaker 2: these would not be legal on our communities, right if
40:54
Speaker 2: they're zoning. If you're in a community with zoning in Montpellier,
40:58
Speaker 2: for example, currently, you know, you couldn't buy most of
41:02
Speaker 2: these off the shelf tiny homes because they're not built
41:05
Speaker 2: to the same housing standard as traditional construction.
41:09
Speaker 1: Right, so buy one at home depot.
41:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, you could buy one at home depot, but if
41:12
Speaker 2: you don't meet all the same requirements as a stick
41:15
Speaker 2: built house on site, it's not going to be permitted, right,
41:18
Speaker 2: so to go buy There's a great Vermont company. Boy,
41:24
Speaker 2: I wish I should have had the name of these guys,
41:26
Speaker 2: but they're building these on wheel kind of accessory dwelling
41:29
Speaker 2: units that are meant for people that have hand they're handy,
41:33
Speaker 2: they need to be handicapped accessible. Right, So, hey, you
41:37
Speaker 2: you became paralyzed or you had, you know, some health
41:39
Speaker 2: issue that requires you to be in a wheelchair. How
41:42
Speaker 2: do you sort of get around? So, if you're a parent,
41:44
Speaker 2: you have this happen to a kid, or it happens
41:46
Speaker 2: to an in law or something, right, your parents, what
41:48
Speaker 2: do you do? Well, you can just drop this on
41:51
Speaker 2: a property. Right, you can buy one of these units
41:52
Speaker 2: and drop it on your property, but it won't meet
41:55
Speaker 2: most of our zoning rules because it wasn't built to
41:57
Speaker 2: that standard. Most of them are built the old they
42:01
Speaker 2: called them park models right there. They're basically built of
42:05
Speaker 2: the r V standard.
42:06
Speaker 3: Right.
42:06
Speaker 2: They're on on wheels with a you know, a chassis
42:09
Speaker 2: that can move around and not be permanent housing. But
42:12
Speaker 2: in most of our communities, I think in Montpelier, for example,
42:15
Speaker 2: maybe you've got one hundred twenty days that you could
42:16
Speaker 2: have somebody there, it's considered camping, right, and so it's like, well,
42:20
Speaker 2: without some zoning reform, people couldn't even like you want
42:23
Speaker 2: to put a yurt in your backyard and let somebody
42:25
Speaker 2: live there. And a lot of our communities that would
42:27
Speaker 2: be illegal.
42:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, we were just stupping down Route one on the
42:33
Speaker 1: coast of Maine near Wells and some of those park models,
42:37
Speaker 1: I mean it's just beautiful, oh.
42:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, gorgeous, rightful. Some of these urts are beautiful. I
42:42
Speaker 2: mean there's a lot, you know, there's a place that
42:45
Speaker 2: has park models over in Stow. They're actually renting them
42:48
Speaker 2: their hospitality units, and they're gorgeous. There are these little
42:52
Speaker 2: a frames. They're beautiful, right but again, could you put
42:55
Speaker 2: one in your backyard? It depends on where.
42:57
Speaker 1: You live, you know. Also on Route one and we
43:00
Speaker 1: saw they were taking containers.
43:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh yeah, container homes, stacking.
43:07
Speaker 1: Them on top of each other, putting some signing on them,
43:11
Speaker 1: and they're beautiful, beautiful, Yeah.
43:15
Speaker 2: I mean again it's it's a permit. What do we
43:18
Speaker 2: want to allow if we really feel we have a
43:21
Speaker 2: crisis or we will want to make space for neighbors
43:23
Speaker 2: that they can have a place to live. Yeah, And
43:26
Speaker 2: and these are the debates that were, you know, again,
43:28
Speaker 2: austerity or abundance. What do we want to have? You know,
43:32
Speaker 2: why should everybody show up because you want to put
43:34
Speaker 2: an apartment above your garage? Why do all your neighbors
43:36
Speaker 2: in that moment want to show up and be like, right,
43:38
Speaker 2: this is this is terrible. You're gonna you know the stories,
43:41
Speaker 2: you know, if you go to any of these hearings, right,
43:43
Speaker 2: like the stories that you hear. Uh, it's it's traumatic.
43:47
Speaker 2: A lot of people don't even want to go. They're like,
43:48
Speaker 2: oh man, I have to go get go to one
43:50
Speaker 2: of those hearings. I don't even want to I don't
43:52
Speaker 2: even want to deal with that. I'm gonna need a
43:54
Speaker 2: therapist when I'm done.
43:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, and again if you haven't Lord the Abundance Agenda podcast.
44:03
Speaker 1: My host is Gay Blotchiness and he started this podcast
44:09
Speaker 1: right here in central Vermont. And you've had some amazing
44:13
Speaker 1: content in just a short period of time. We started
44:15
Speaker 1: this thing a couple of months ago, right.
44:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, just getting going, you know, just trying to figure.
44:19
Speaker 1: Out what made you say I'm doing this.
44:24
Speaker 2: You know, I just I feel like going through these
44:28
Speaker 2: processes where you see again a minority of voices stopping
44:35
Speaker 2: you know, development in communities. Right So in mont Pilier
44:38
Speaker 2: right now, there's a new development team that's that's there.
44:42
Speaker 2: They're trying to do a two four flex projects, one
44:45
Speaker 2: for Capstone Community Action and another one for Habitat for Humanity,
44:50
Speaker 2: both agencies that were like, these are good people. These
44:53
Speaker 2: are good people doing good things. Neighbors have appealed their project,
44:58
Speaker 2: they have to go to environmental court. It's like why,
45:01
Speaker 2: you know why, And so it's you know. And then
45:04
Speaker 2: watching again the Green Mountain Careboard and the discussions of
45:07
Speaker 2: our hospital like fourteen hospitals potentially closing and housing is
45:11
Speaker 2: identified as the number one issue. It just seems like
45:14
Speaker 2: we need to create more education so people can understand.
45:18
Speaker 2: And frankly, the solution is not just a big developer
45:21
Speaker 2: coming in here and doing everything. The answer is a
45:23
Speaker 2: lot of small developers saying, yeah, I'm gonna put an
45:27
Speaker 2: ad in my backyard. Yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna, you know,
45:30
Speaker 2: carve up this property and turn it into three apartments.
45:33
Speaker 2: Yeah I'm gonna. You know, it's gonna take a bunch
45:36
Speaker 2: of us to do a lot of small things to
45:39
Speaker 2: really make a difference. I'll say this too, So for
45:42
Speaker 2: if you look at Tiff or you look at this
45:44
Speaker 2: new program chip that was just passed this last year,
45:48
Speaker 2: those things are gonna harness the tax revenues. Such again
45:51
Speaker 2: it's community Housing Infrastructure program, and it's very similar to
45:56
Speaker 2: tax increment finance, where basically they're gonna they're gonna grab
46:00
Speaker 2: the property tax revenues over the next twenty years to
46:02
Speaker 2: pay down that bond. But that's also something to think about. So, yes,
46:06
Speaker 2: we're going to get those big projects done now that
46:09
Speaker 2: you know, we hope would happen on their own, but
46:11
Speaker 2: aren't because you know, infrastructure is just too expensive to
46:14
Speaker 2: you know, for people to invest in and make happen,
46:17
Speaker 2: right from a pure commercial market rate standpoint, But you
46:22
Speaker 2: think about it, that full property tax role isn't going
46:25
Speaker 2: to hit until twenty years from now. Whereas if you
46:28
Speaker 2: put an ADU on your property, right, or you subdivide,
46:31
Speaker 2: you have a double lot and you sell that other
46:33
Speaker 2: lot and somebody builds a new house immediately, that's on
46:36
Speaker 2: the tax rolls, right. So all those small developments, you
46:39
Speaker 2: know what you're seeing in California that twenty percent of
46:42
Speaker 2: building permits being for these accessory dwelling and it's all
46:45
Speaker 2: these small movements and incremental value that's going to increase
46:49
Speaker 2: our tax space, which is what we really need. We
46:51
Speaker 2: need a bigger tax base, We need more people here working,
46:54
Speaker 2: We need more workers, right, Like that's the big thing,
46:57
Speaker 2: two hundred thousand workers, right, we need more young people
47:00
Speaker 2: that want to live here and want to work.
47:02
Speaker 1: Amen. Again today, polls are open till seven o'clock tonight
47:07
Speaker 1: on election day up at the Barry Auditorium to vote
47:09
Speaker 1: for Article one, which is a two point lots of
47:13
Speaker 1: different bond votes here, there's mainly three the Central Vermont
47:17
Speaker 1: Career Center, and of course Article two, the three point
47:22
Speaker 1: three million needed to get the public Works building up
47:27
Speaker 1: to up to code and the two point four million
47:31
Speaker 1: dollars for infrastructure to support the Stevens Branch apartments. Seminary
47:38
Speaker 1: Street is what we really know that to be, which
47:41
Speaker 1: is thirty one flood resilient affordable housing units developed by
47:46
Speaker 1: Downstreet Housing. It says here, bringing new residents to the
47:50
Speaker 1: heart of the city, to increase vibrancy to shops, restaurants
47:53
Speaker 1: and schools. Improved public parking, expanded green space, repaving on
47:58
Speaker 1: West Street which is horrible. Debt service payments paid with
48:05
Speaker 1: tiff generated from increased downtown property values, not as an
48:11
Speaker 1: increase to the tax rate.
48:13
Speaker 2: So yeah, pretty important issues.
48:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, really important stuff. I mean, people are and you've
48:20
Speaker 1: heard this plenty of times. I don't need to tell you.
48:23
Speaker 1: People are are alarmed right now by a lot of things.
48:28
Speaker 1: The cost of living and inflation, and this is going up,
48:32
Speaker 1: and that's going up, and the elderly here in our
48:38
Speaker 1: state with aging homes are sewer and water rates. The
48:47
Speaker 1: list goes on and on. We can't afford this, We
48:50
Speaker 1: can't afford it. I'm already tapped out enough as it is,
48:55
Speaker 1: and now you're asking me to increase my taxes even
48:59
Speaker 1: more to support one hundred and forty nine million dollar
49:04
Speaker 1: career center. I can't afford this.
49:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there's a ton of afooryability issues right
49:10
Speaker 2: and and the issue is do we want to reverse
49:12
Speaker 2: it or are we just going to continue down the
49:14
Speaker 2: path that we're on. And the only way to reverse
49:17
Speaker 2: it again, I would just point people to that Vermont
49:19
Speaker 2: Future Project study. The data is all there. It just
49:22
Speaker 2: shows we need a couple hundred thousand workers. What's it
49:24
Speaker 2: going to take to get young people to move here?
49:26
Speaker 2: Get young people to stay here?
49:28
Speaker 3: Right?
49:28
Speaker 2: I mean here, here's the thing. Like if you go
49:30
Speaker 2: out and you try, like you have any project. I
49:33
Speaker 2: just did this little I needed I needed a little
49:35
Speaker 2: bathroom project. Done, right, You try to go find somebody
49:38
Speaker 2: to do a little project, a little project.
49:40
Speaker 1: I know, we I talked about this yesterday.
49:42
Speaker 2: We try to get somebody to do a big project,
49:44
Speaker 2: I know project. You know what's happened is we have
49:48
Speaker 2: fewer workers than we've ever had. We've had a bunch
49:51
Speaker 2: of federal dollars frankly from the flooding that really, you know,
49:54
Speaker 2: like we got to five hundred dollars you go look
49:56
Speaker 2: at I mean, you know, I love the I love
49:58
Speaker 2: the downstreet projects. I love all these affordable housing projects,
50:01
Speaker 2: you know, but they're like coming at five hundred and
50:03
Speaker 2: fifty dollars a square foot, right, I mean that's where
50:06
Speaker 2: we've gotten to. I'm building actively with my brother over
50:09
Speaker 2: in New Hampshire, and I'll tell you all in our
50:11
Speaker 2: costs are like two hundred dollars a square foot because
50:14
Speaker 2: they don't have the labor crisis that we have over here. Right,
50:16
Speaker 2: It's like there's just nobody to do the work, and
50:20
Speaker 2: so they can cherry pick, you know, and good for them,
50:22
Speaker 2: but we need more young people to come in here
50:25
Speaker 2: to start businesses, to be well into work.
50:27
Speaker 1: Gabe, are you a state Rep?
50:30
Speaker 2: I am not.
50:33
Speaker 1: You hold no political office I have.
50:37
Speaker 2: I'm on some I have some appointed positions that I
50:40
Speaker 2: serve on.
50:42
Speaker 1: Have you been under the Golden Dome at any point
50:46
Speaker 1: recently to voice some of this?
50:50
Speaker 2: I mean, I've I've been, I've been over there. I
50:53
Speaker 2: don't know that I've lobbied extensively. If that's what you're
50:55
Speaker 2: asking now, you should. Yeah, I mean, we are having
51:01
Speaker 2: some really good work done. I will say the legislature.
51:04
Speaker 2: You know, again, this chip was a was a big deal.
51:07
Speaker 2: The Act two fifty reform was a big deal. There's
51:10
Speaker 2: some good work being done over there, but we certainly
51:12
Speaker 2: we need more voices talking about that.
51:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean the comments that are coming in from
51:17
Speaker 1: mounts becoming unaffordable to live in. We're trying to increase
51:20
Speaker 1: our population, not force them out because of the fact
51:23
Speaker 1: that it's unaffordable. We won't need workers because we won't
51:29
Speaker 1: need to build anything exactly right.
51:32
Speaker 2: That's I mean, that's the other alternative, right, because we
51:34
Speaker 2: just you know, who can afford to live here.
51:39
Speaker 1: What would you say if you had an hour to
51:44
Speaker 1: sit down and have a cup of coffee with with
51:48
Speaker 1: Phil Scott?
51:50
Speaker 2: Oh, that's a that's a great question. You know, it's
51:54
Speaker 2: interesting watching the governor and watching the legislature and the
51:58
Speaker 2: direction they've taken. And you know, you have from you know,
52:03
Speaker 2: an outsider looking at I think we all look at this.
52:05
Speaker 2: You know, we just talk about healthcare as an example,
52:07
Speaker 2: or education is another good one too, But let's just
52:09
Speaker 2: talk about healthcare for a second. We've got really good
52:12
Speaker 2: data that says our hospitals are going to go bankrupt,
52:15
Speaker 2: most of them, that services are going to be cut, right,
52:20
Speaker 2: and what's being done, you know, and so the legislature
52:24
Speaker 2: they there was a big bill that was passed last year.
52:27
Speaker 2: I don't know that much. You look at, well what
52:29
Speaker 2: got done? You know, there was an education bill that
52:31
Speaker 2: was passed last year. Well what got done? Did we
52:34
Speaker 2: actually do anything to make anything more affordable? And it
52:37
Speaker 2: just seems like there's a there's a little bit of
52:39
Speaker 2: fall the herd to you have to do something, like
52:43
Speaker 2: we have to do something, and so like bad legislation
52:47
Speaker 2: is better than no legislation. I don't know if that's
52:49
Speaker 2: I don't know. I'm not over there, so I don't know.
52:51
Speaker 2: I don't know if that's really the case. If we're
52:52
Speaker 2: not actually saving money solving the problem, Like why don't
52:56
Speaker 2: we take our time, why don't we work on something
52:58
Speaker 2: that's you know, why don't we take a couple of
52:59
Speaker 2: years and figure out what's really going to work instead
53:01
Speaker 2: of passing bills? You know what's are we really going
53:04
Speaker 2: to save any money out of the sede? We certainly
53:06
Speaker 2: are going to consolidate some schools or certainly going to
53:09
Speaker 2: have some school closures. We're certainly going to have some
53:10
Speaker 2: hospital closures. Are we fixing the problem? There was something
53:14
Speaker 2: in the healthcare bill reference based pricing, although it doesn't
53:17
Speaker 2: come online for a couple of years, but that was
53:19
Speaker 2: one thing that actually did get into the legislation that
53:22
Speaker 2: that will affect affordability. So that piece was pretty.
53:24
Speaker 1: Good reference based pricing.
53:27
Speaker 2: Yes, the idea of reference based pricing is, you know, look,
53:29
Speaker 2: Medicaid only pays a certain amount for or Medicare only
53:32
Speaker 2: pays a certain amount for certain procedures. We will only
53:35
Speaker 2: reimburse you some certain percentage over what that rate is.
53:41
Speaker 2: We're not going to pay you any more than that.
53:42
Speaker 2: So therefore hospitals and insurers figure out how to make
53:45
Speaker 2: those numbers work. We're not going to overpay for procedures
53:49
Speaker 2: that you're doing in Vermont, so that's part of it.
53:51
Speaker 2: I think. I don't know. You know, again, I'm not
53:53
Speaker 2: an expert on healthcare. I'm a housing guy. But you know,
53:56
Speaker 2: I just think these are issues. I think we need
53:58
Speaker 2: to continue to work on housing. We need to continue
54:00
Speaker 2: to you know, Bolster. I mean again, there was a
54:03
Speaker 2: great program the governor sponsored a couple of years ago,
54:06
Speaker 2: missing middle. Uh, there was a program that they sponsored
54:09
Speaker 2: ten percent for Vermont, which was to take some of
54:11
Speaker 2: the state reserves and make them available at low interest loans,
54:16
Speaker 2: all things that would be repaid, but low interest that
54:18
Speaker 2: could make housing projects more affordable, you know. Continuing to
54:21
Speaker 2: do those kinds of things, and then really we need
54:23
Speaker 2: we need to look at what it's going to take
54:24
Speaker 2: to attract talent.
54:26
Speaker 1: Newton, you are, you're still with us. What would you
54:30
Speaker 1: say to Phil if you had a chance to sit
54:33
Speaker 1: down with him and chew the fat for an hour?
54:37
Speaker 3: That's a good question.
54:40
Speaker 4: But but I mean, I would I would encourage people
54:44
Speaker 4: to well, there's lots of things I'd like to say
54:48
Speaker 4: to Bill Scott, I guess, but but I would encourage
54:51
Speaker 4: more of this auxiliary dwelling stuff. And I think that
54:55
Speaker 4: that uh, you know, loosening the laws so that people
55:00
Speaker 4: people can make better use of land that's already developed.
55:03
Speaker 4: Is a it's a great idea. I mean, you know,
55:07
Speaker 4: you know we're going to have a land, We're going
55:08
Speaker 4: to have a house on two acres, you know, going
55:12
Speaker 4: up and down a street. You know, every two acres
55:14
Speaker 4: another building. You might as well just double it at
55:16
Speaker 4: this point if you can. But because you know, it
55:22
Speaker 4: prevents the sprawl problem that we had back when zoning
55:27
Speaker 4: throughout the state. You know, thirty years ago was was
55:30
Speaker 4: ten acre lots. So it ate up a whole lot
55:33
Speaker 4: of former farmland with one little house on every ten acres.
55:36
Speaker 3: It's crazy.
55:40
Speaker 1: Good stuff. Thanks buddy, Thanks for thanks for being with
55:44
Speaker 1: us this morning, Pal, I appreciate you.
55:46
Speaker 3: Man.
55:48
Speaker 1: Gayblo Geness is our guest this morning the Abundance Agenda Podcast.
55:56
Speaker 1: How often are you shooting this thing?
55:59
Speaker 2: It just it's when I have an idea and when
56:01
Speaker 2: I think I can get the right people together. So
56:03
Speaker 2: I think it's been about every other week is what
56:05
Speaker 2: I've done. I think the next angle I want to
56:08
Speaker 2: go down is I want to talk to some tiny
56:10
Speaker 2: home developers. Yeah, and actually put some product up so
56:14
Speaker 2: people can kind of think about it. And and to
56:16
Speaker 2: your guest point, it is true, right, the challenge of
56:19
Speaker 2: the infrastructure and all that those costs. It's not cheap
56:22
Speaker 2: like you can't again if you take you know, you
56:24
Speaker 2: get a park model. That may be the cheapest sort
56:27
Speaker 2: of option, but again it's not legal in most places.
56:30
Speaker 2: If you're going to build a structure, you're going to
56:31
Speaker 2: spend some money to do it. One of the shows
56:34
Speaker 2: I had really got into the numbers and showed that, Look,
56:37
Speaker 2: I mean, if the numbers work out there, probably it's
56:39
Speaker 2: going to get funded. Right, You're going to be able
56:41
Speaker 2: to get funding for that. But I want to I
56:43
Speaker 2: want to show some product. Right, Let's get some cool
56:45
Speaker 2: product up that people can kind of take a look
56:47
Speaker 2: at and see who some of these developers are where
56:50
Speaker 2: you might be able to get some solutions for stuff
56:52
Speaker 2: like that. But I think that's the next series that
56:54
Speaker 2: I'm going to work on.
56:56
Speaker 1: Listen, Uh, today's your day to cast your vote. It's
57:01
Speaker 1: election day locally here. I mean there's some really big
57:06
Speaker 1: ticket items that are up for grabs here statewide, nationally,
57:13
Speaker 1: we're going to be watching the forecast here is going
57:15
Speaker 1: to be very interesting to see how things unfolded in
57:22
Speaker 1: New Jersey and New York. By the way, we had
57:28
Speaker 1: a report of some bomb threats at some of the
57:31
Speaker 1: polling stations in New Jersey this morning, so hopefully they've
57:36
Speaker 1: got that situation under control. But here locally, the auditorium
57:44
Speaker 1: is open till seven o'clock tonight. Please get yourself up
57:47
Speaker 1: there if you haven't yet, If you need a ride
57:51
Speaker 1: reach out. There's plenty of folks in town that will
57:56
Speaker 1: get you up to cast your vote. This is so
57:58
Speaker 1: important again. Seminary Street. One of the big big ticket items.
58:08
Speaker 1: Article one, the two point four million needed for infrastructure
58:14
Speaker 1: to support that thirty one unit building, and Article two
58:22
Speaker 1: three point three million to get our public works garage
58:28
Speaker 1: up and functioning. Less than eight dollars a month, I
58:35
Speaker 1: think is what our city manager, Nicholas stir Eli Castro
58:39
Speaker 1: said on the air when he was here a short
58:43
Speaker 1: time ago. There's some you know, there's some really big
58:48
Speaker 1: things that are needed. Our water treatment facility. I mean,
58:52
Speaker 1: the list goes on.
58:53
Speaker 2: I mean, you know, you look at the we drive around,
58:58
Speaker 2: like you know, we see the infrastructure grades across the
59:00
Speaker 2: United States. We got roads and bridges with d's. I mean,
59:03
Speaker 2: I don't know how anything in Vermont gets anything button
59:06
Speaker 2: a f like our infrastructure is terrible, and yeah it
59:10
Speaker 2: takes investment to fix any of this stuff, But what
59:13
Speaker 2: are we passing on to our kids? Like, it's just
59:15
Speaker 2: crazy to me that we are not spending money on
59:18
Speaker 2: fixing things that need to be fixed that we're doing short.
59:21
Speaker 2: You know that we're not doing the right kind of engineering.
59:23
Speaker 2: We're doing things that we know we're going to get
59:25
Speaker 2: destroyed and going to need, you know, more millions of
59:28
Speaker 2: dollars poured into them, do it right the first time.
59:29
Speaker 2: You know that the Agency of Transportation does a great
59:32
Speaker 2: job on the state highways, you know, but we're you know,
59:35
Speaker 2: our municipalities don't invest the money. It's like, look guys,
59:38
Speaker 2: it's going to get you like being cheap cost you
59:40
Speaker 2: more in the end. Let's just invest what it takes
59:43
Speaker 2: to have what is it that we want to build,
59:45
Speaker 2: and let's invest what it takes to have what we want.
59:48
Speaker 1: Fascinating to t I wish I wish we could hear
59:53
Speaker 1: that echode a little bit more what you just said,
59:59
Speaker 1: and that's why you started this podcast. I think your
1:00:02
Speaker 1: your voice is is getting out there. You're you're already
1:00:06
Speaker 1: getting people that are paying attention to the Abundance Agenda podcast,
1:00:10
Speaker 1: and I think that's that's fantastic. Listen, man, you're my
1:00:16
Speaker 1: microphones are yours. I know you got your own, but
1:00:22
Speaker 1: I invite you to come back in here any damn
1:00:25
Speaker 1: time you want. You're you're talking about some of the
1:00:27
Speaker 1: most important stuff that our cities, our towns needs to
1:00:33
Speaker 1: be discussing.
1:00:34
Speaker 2: Well, thank you. I appreciate that, and thank you for
1:00:36
Speaker 2: the good work you're doing. I mean, you're, you know,
1:00:38
Speaker 2: bringing a local voice to local issues every day of
1:00:40
Speaker 2: the week. Pretty awesome.
1:00:42
Speaker 1: Thanks, Thanks Gabe. I really appreciate your time. Man, come
1:00:46
Speaker 1: back soon.
1:00:47
Speaker 2: Thank you.
1:00:47
Speaker 1: Let's let's see how things pan out here after today
1:00:51
Speaker 1: sounds good, and see what the temperature is in another
1:00:57
Speaker 1: couple of weeks. On housing, this issue is not going
1:01:02
Speaker 1: to be going away.
1:01:03
Speaker 2: Tomorrow, going away. We're not working our way out of
1:01:06
Speaker 2: this doing tomorrow.
1:01:07
Speaker 1: Buckle up, my friend. You got a lot. You've got
1:01:09
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff to talk about on the Abundance
1:01:11
Speaker 1: Agenda a lot, and I look forward to following it
1:01:14
Speaker 1: and listen into it. Catch it in the car, catch
1:01:17
Speaker 1: it on the go, no matter where you are, if
1:01:18
Speaker 1: you're if you're making dinner at night. Just turn it on,
1:01:23
Speaker 1: have it on, listen, pay attention. Uh, this guy right
1:01:26
Speaker 1: here is really shaking it up, and nobody else is
1:01:30
Speaker 1: doing it here in Central Vermont. Gabe Lagins the Abundance
1:01:34
Speaker 1: Agenda podcast. Check it out. Thanks so much. Man.
1:01:38
Speaker 3: All right