Ellis Mills, a Montpelier firm run by Kevin Ellis and Bryan Mills, has started setting up meetings for David Hall, who plans to visit Vermont several times this summer.
Residents reacted with alarm in March, when a local blogger wrote about Hall’s proposal to build a futuristic, environmentally sustainable community of 20,000 people at the hilly intersection of Sharon, South Royalton, Strafford and Tunbridge. The plan is based on a Mormon document known as the Plat of Zion.
By the time the news broke, Hall had already purchased about 900 of the 5,000 acres he says he needs. Vermont Public Radio reported in late April that Hall is acquiring another 500 acres.
Amid the outcry, Ellis saw an opportunity. “I called [Hall] up,” said the inveterate lobbyist, who previously co-founded KSE. “I said, ‘You need a guide.'”
He paraphrased his pitch: “The Vermont landscape is littered with projects … that fail mostly because the developer doesn’t understand the needs of the local communities and is unwilling to talk to people, be transparent and adjust the outlook of the project to better fit the needs of the local community.”
In the weeks after Hall’s plans became public, the engineer did his best to respond to concerns, assuring people that it would be years before his plan came to fruition. Despite his efforts, plenty of people remain staunchly opposed to the concept.
Ellis, who lived in Strafford for eight years and coached high school basketball in Sharon, knows many of the project’s opponents well.
What does he think of Hall’s vision?
“This may be a great idea,” Ellis said. At a time when Vermonters are concerned about shrinking enrollment in schools, an aging population and depressed downtowns, he said, it’s worth paying attention to a proposal “that would inject millions of dollars and lots of new people into communities.”
Ellis said he currently has no plans to lobby for any legislative changes the project might require — he and Hall haven’t discussed the possibility. Right now, he’s focused on reaching out to local officials and residents.
“I think this is a discussion worth having, and I wanted to be in the middle of it,” Ellis said.
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Vermont has a history of intentional communities being established here. We’re a small but tolerant and welcoming state. I assume that is a tradition that we will keep.
Thank god for “rural character” policies in the towns involved. Sharon currently has about 1500 residents. 20,000 more won’t fit with anyone’s idea of “rural nature.” It would make Sharon the second largest municipality in the state. No thanks.
Vermont may have a history of intentional communities, but the scale and concept of this project are absurd. Such a shame that Ellis is looking to make a quick buck at the expense of local interests.
20,000 new members in VT, and they will be Mormons. That will upset the current political landscape for sure.
This might be fun to see how it shifts things
Rutland’s Mayor unilaterally decided to bring Syrian refugees into the city, at least this Mormon engineer is making an effort to speak to local officials.
Our Governor and the legislation are selling Vermont.. how much are they getting paid to do this? Vermont the rural state will be no more.. lets just make it another commune state…Why don’t the true Vermonters just turn Vermont over to these massive commune people..who knows it might turn out to be another Jonestown” the informal name for the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project who all committed suicide..
Hmm. . . I question whether if this were about a bunch of socialist wanna-bes planning to move here to set up an “intentional” utopian commune we’d be hearing a peep of protest from these “concerned” citizens.
It’s not something we need here in Vermont. It will put money into the state as it develops but will create a burden with an influx of people who have nothing because they give everything to the New Vista and will live under the direction of a board of directors. This is not the life myself and many others wish for. Mr. Hall says that his New Vista will take up a percentage of the state which will be populated and the rest of the state will be rural which will not be the case. When you bring in one million people to the state, the rest of us will populate the rest of the state creating an over population and VT now becomes suburban or city like.
“Amid the outcry, Ellis saw an opportunity.” You got that right! He saw opportunity to enrich himself at the expense of the people and communities of the Upper Valley!
How shameless and despicable that a Vermont-based lobbying firm like Ellis-Mills would take on the promotion of a project like this, forcing this corporatist Orwellian hell onto a region and towns with complete and utter disregard for the people and communities who live there, and their form of governance. It makes me despise corporate lobbyists even more, and shows they will do anything, even throw their own communities under the bus, to make a buck.
Looks like Kevin Ellis has secured permanent work for the rest of his career, and the Tunbridge-Sharon-Royalton-Strafford community and all of Vermont be damned. Since his firm also works for politician’s campaigns and “government affairs”, you can bet he will do what he can to try to get laws changed to help his new client get his project built. That’s what these wealthy out of state developers do when they force their development delusions of grandeur on Vermont. Jesse Sammis did the same thing at Exit 4. He had only given money to Republican election campaigns in the past, until 2012 when he suddenly gave money to Shumlin. That same year Shumlin signed an agreement with Sammis for a privatized rest area in exchange for 1.15 million square feet of development on prime farmland, and Shumlin went to work for Sammis and tried to get the legislature to weaken Act 250 to make Sammis’s Exit 4 disaster easier to get permitted (as reported in the Valley News). This is what David Hall will try to do, and it appears Kevin Ellis has sold his soul to do that bidding for him.