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For more than six years, the Vermont Racial Justice Alliance has worked with the City of Burlington to address systemic racism and racial disparities in policing, public safety, housing, health, economic opportunity, and other systems affecting Black Burlingtonians.
That work did not begin with Burlington Forward.
Beginning in 2020, Burlington adopted the Racial Justice Through Economic and Criminal Justice Resolution, declared Racism a Public Health Emergency, engaged with Operation Phoenix R.I.S.E., and later developed a Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap. The work also included the Talitha community process, the CNA public-safety assessment and recommendations, a Reparations Task Force, alternative-response initiatives, REIB infrastructure, and other commitments intended to transform public safety and address racial inequality.
Much of that work remains unfinished.
And today, Burlington is confronting the consequences.
In 2025, Black people were involved in 99 Burlington Police use-of-force person-incidents—the highest number recorded in the available series dating to 2012. Black people accounted for approximately 28 percent of people subjected to force, despite representing less than five percent of Burlington’s population. Even when police interactions rather than population are used as the comparison, Black people were subjected to force at nearly three times the rate of White people.
At the same time, the City Council is considering Burlington Forward, a major new public-safety framework.
VRJA has engaged the proposal seriously and constructively. Important changes have been made. The revised proposal now contains stronger language addressing systemic inequity, civil rights, equal protection, demographic accountability, public health, and diversion.
But the central problem remains:
Burlington is moving toward greater public-safety and enforcement capacity while the racial-justice transformation intended to address disparities in those very systems remains incomplete.
This is not a choice between public safety and racial justice.
We need both.
It is not a choice between accountability and civil rights.
We need both.
And it cannot become simply a dispute between Democrats and Progressives.
The responsibility now belongs to the Mayor and the entire Burlington City Council.
As we wrote in our open letter:
Past responsibility may be distributed. Present responsibility cannot be avoided.
We Need the Community to Act
The Burlington City Council will take up Burlington Forward tomorrow.
We are asking community members to contact the Mayor and City Council and ask them to:
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require a public accounting of Burlington’s unfinished racial-justice commitments;
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directly address racial disparities in police contact, arrests, and use of force;
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require an independent review and corrective-action plan;
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ensure that enforcement expansion does not move faster than civil-rights accountability; and
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give racial justice, housing, health, economic security, community investment, and alternative public-safety infrastructure the same urgency and implementation power given to enforcement.
Most importantly, ask every elected official:
What is your plan to address the racial disparities Black people are experiencing in Burlington right now?
Read the Open Letter
Read VRJA’s full Open Letter to the Mayor and Burlington City Council:
https://vtracialjusticealliance.org/2026/10/open-letter-on-burlington-forward/
Then contact the Mayor and members of the City Council and let them know that Burlington cannot simply move on from commitments it has not completed.
Contact the Mayor’s Office
Burlington City Council and Councilor contacts
October 26 City Council meeting information and agenda.
Burlington does not need to start over.
It needs to finish what it promised, correct what the data show is failing, and make public safety and equal protection real for everyone.
Vermont Racial Justice Alliance
The Legacy of Slavery Made Civil Rights Necessary. Civil Rights Made Democracy Possible.
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