Hooper for Middlebury

ISSUES

Downtown Vitality

Transportation

Affordability

Hi, I am running for the Middlebury Town Select Board. I have a passion for local government, and hope that you will do me the honor of representing you in our continued efforts to maintain a vital and supportive community for all.

Please take a minute to review this page, read about the candidates, and vote on March 1st, 2022 at the Middlebury Recreation Center Gymnasium on Creek Road between 7am - 7pm. If you would prefer to vote by mail, please request a ballot by visiting mvp.vermont.gov, by emailing our town clerk at awebster@townofmiddlebury.org or by calling 802-388-8100 X211 or 212.

If you think I've missed important issues, or you would like to talk about your own priorities for our town, please reach out by email, phone call, or text.

ISSUES

There are always more important things to do than there is time, money or energy to pursue them, but these are some of the immediate and longer term issues that I'd like to focus on.

If you'd like to know my thoughts about issues that I haven't mentioned here, please drop me a note, and I'll answer you directly or add it to this site.

Downtown Vitality

The disruption of the rail project is now behind us, and there is finally the appearance of light at the end of this dark COVID-19 tunnel. It is time for the Select Board to help our local economy thrive, to keep our downtown viable, and to attract new business ventures that serve our entire community.

Both the natural beauty and the manmade architecture is wonderful, but over the past few years we have lost a lot of downtown businesses. It's not obvious how town government can encourage new businesses to take root, but there are great opportunities to support the Better Middlebury Partnership and other groups, and I think this must be the focus of the select board over the next few years.

We all benefit from a downtown that combines activities, commerce and housing and encourages us all to congregate and enjoy our town.

Transportation

I think many locals are excited to get on a train in town and head up to Burlington or down to New York City, but we also need to figure out how to best encourage healthy mobility (like biking and hiking) for those that can and also provide essential mobility for those that cannot.

The ACTR bus system is a wonderful asset, but we need to look seriously at utilization and see if we can come up with a plan that better targets the specific needs of the population that relies on this service.

Affordability

Middlebury has both the benefits and challenges of being a shire town. Residents have local access to entertainment, goods and services - but also pay property taxes to support a full-time police force and other amenities which the surrounding rural towns do not.

We want to encourage people to both work and live in Middlebury, but the existing incentives often make it cheaper to live in the surrounding towns and come to Middlebury for work and groceries, leaving it to the local population to support both the public infrastructure and services.

This is very tough issue, and like the other issues above, is common across Vermont. There are no easy answers, but as large towns like Waterbury forego local police departments for contracts with the State Police and Central Vermont looks to regionalize their public safety departments we need to look for creative ways to make our municipal services more sustainable and more equitable.

ENDORSEMENTS

Endorsements

BIO

Deep roots

My parents met at Middlebury College in the late '60s. I was born in Newport some years later, and grew up mostly in Northfield, two mountains east of here.

I was in the Northfield public schools through my junior high school year, spent my senior year at Vermont Technical College in Randolph and then I went as far away as I could imagine for college, eager to see bigger and better things.

I studied physics and applied mathematics at UC Berkeley and later attended Columbia Law School. The adage that you can't appreciate a place until you leave was true for me; I discovered that there is no place where I am as comfortable and understand the people as well as I do in Vermont. Neither the forced ruggedness of Alaskans, the learned chill of Californians, nor the self-importance of Manhattanites compares with the honesty and integrity of the vast majority of Vermonters.

I came back in Vermont over 20 years ago to start a family and set down roots. I lived in Montpelier through my 30s, working first for an internet startup, then as a IT consultant for small and medium sized businesses and non-profits around central Vermont. Eleven years ago I was hired by Cabot/Agri·Mark as a programmer, and I worked there until this month, becoming the manager of the programming group at the corporate office over the hill in Waitsfield. I have just begun work at Union Mutual in Montpelier as the Director of IT Systems and Security.

After discovering my true love was living in Middlebury I quickly relocated here seven years ago - first to South Munger Street on the edge of town, and then a few years later within a short walk of downtown.

Our family has three sons, Cullen 12, Finn 14, Zeke 20, and a daughter, 15 year old Bea. Our pup Ferris is still fascinated by snow, and, in the interest of solving ancient mysteries, we are trying to dissuade our chickens from crossing the road.

History of service

Since attending town meetings with my mom in the Northfield high school gym ages ago, I have been fascinated with how people get together to create the institutions and rules to live together.

During my undergraduate years at Berkeley I volunteered for the Green Party, helping new voters fill out registration forms on a folding ironing board on campus and on the streets, hoping to defeat the anti-immigrant Proposition 187.

Once I returned to Vermont, a friend in Montpelier urged me to volunteer on the Central Vermont Reparative Probation Board - working with first time offenders to help them connect with the broader community and make amends, rather than being processed through the criminal justice system. It didn't always work, but when it did - it was amazing.

I had the privilege of serving four terms on the Montpelier City Council and as Montpelier representative to the Central Vermont Solid Waste District, the ECFiber Communication District and assorted committees of the council.

After I moved to Middlebury in 2014, I spent a few years figuring out my new community, my new commute, and our big blended family and then reentered political service. I was elected to the Ilsley Library Board of Trustees, where I serve as Treasurer, and have been appointed by the selectboard to the Addison County Regional Planning Commission, the Addison County Solid Waste District, and the Addison County Communications Union District, now branded as Maple Broadband.

CONTACT

T. Andrew Hooper
Middlebury, VT 05753

Call or text message at (802) 229.1237
email ahooper.vt@gmail.com