Winooski voters today approved a referendum article opposing the Pentagon’s decision to base F-35 fighter jets at nearby Burlington International Airport in 2020.

By a 572-475 vote, residents backed the non-binding referendum, which asked whether the city should join a lawsuit in which anti-F-35 activists are seeking to prevent the planes from coming to Vermont.

The plaintiffs, who include four Winooski residents, claim the military failed to perform required environmental reviews before deciding to place the jets in Burlington. Activists had fought for years to block the planes, citing the noise levels caused by their takeoffs and landings. The F-35 noise zone will affect 6,600 local residents, including many in the Onion City.

The article was strictly advisory. The city council has the authority to compel the city to join the ongoing litigation, which is being heard in U.S. District Court in Burlington.

No other communities are parties in the lawsuit, which is still in its early stages and could take years to resolve. James Dumont, the attorney representing the plaintiffs, told Seven Days last month that he hoped Winooski would sign up. Dumont said he would not necessarily seek to have the city make a financial contribution to the case.

Seth Leonard, who won the mayor’s race, said of the referendum, “Now, we go back and do our legal homework.”

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Mark Davis was a Seven Days staff writer 2013-2018.

6 replies on “Winooski Voters Approve Joining Suit to Oppose F-35”

  1. This is really sad. As a spouse of an Air National Guard Airman, I’m appalled at the lack of support our heroes deserve for serving and protecting us. Over 2,000 families rely on the base for employment.

  2. I’m not at all surprised by the outcome Shannon Garrett Trainer but certainly share your feelings. This is just a decision made to meet personal “needs” and “wants” while completely ignoring what’s best for everyone in Vermont and the entire Northeastern United States. The lawsuit may be completely moot and a waste of money as in the long run, with other communities lined up to openly accept the F-35s that the Air Force will not waste the time and effort fightng a frivolous, unpatriotic legal action and just go elsewhere where the benefits of housing the F-35 will be appreciated.

  3. God bless our Heros for switching from jets to flying quiet little drones over seas to bomb families that ultimately matter way less than ours do; ’cause they don’t make so much darn noise.. (The drones that is) I’m trying to raise a family here!

  4. To argue that “2000 [military] families rely on the base for employment” is no reason to have some military base continue indefinitely. That base has serious adverse consequences, besides noise (and the implied costs and injuries of a high-speed military attack craft crashing). And that is: the base consumes scarce resources, specifically land and the ability to access the runway from that land. For example, the base sitting there prevents the assembly of civilian aircraft. An aircraft plant would have much higher employment, and much greater wage levels, than some military base for combat aircraft. Also, as a federal installation, a military base hardly pays taxes to the local community for consuming its scarce land resources. Do try to keep that in mind.

  5. While over 2,000 families rely on the base for employment, over 7,000 people live in Winooski and another 3-4,000 in the impacted parts of South Burlington. Those people rely on their homes for raising their children; as a place to live; and as their largest asset for retirement. If the Air National Guard wants to pay 1990s’s fair market value for every single property in Winooski and the northeast side of South Burlington, be my guest. The Constitution’s 5th Amendment requires just compensation for taking of private property, and that is exactly what the Air National Guard is doing. The Pentagon is supposed to defend our country and its citizens – not make them homeless and refugees in their own land! The people most impacted sadly are the elderly; low-income working class; immigrant refugees; and handful of disabled veterans – the very populations Bernie Sanders pretends to care about!

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