8/20/2025
Please mark your calendars for September, 11th at 6:30pm! The Town of Essex Planning Commission will be hosting officials from the Vermont Department of Buildings and General Services, as well as the Vermont Department of Corrections. They will be discussing questions submitted by the Planning Commission regarding how our community may be impacted by the construction of the replacement women's correctional facility.
Meeting Details:
September 11, 2025 - 6:30pm
Essex High School
2 Educational Drive
Essex Junction, VT 05452
Come speak out. State officials may or may not answer your questions and concerns, but your input can help guide how our Planning Commission navigates the protracted fact-gathering phase of the zoning amendment process.
I believe we have a good chance of stopping this zoning amendment from ever taking effect. We have an opportunity to tell town and state leadership we do not want a prison built in our community, but it is also an opportunity to tell them how we would like to see $100,000,000 spent in our community instead? Join me in sharing to the commission how we could see that kind of money being spent locally.
Planning Commission email: community-development@essex.org
Please make sure to send your email to the following address prior to 9:00am on Sept. 5th, so it can be included in the meeting packet and entered into the public record. The Planning Commisison is responsible for realizing the vision outlined in our town plan, we have been told that if we want to build and maintain our community in accordance to the Town Plan, we need to do that through zoning regulations. Now is our opportunity. Our work will become more difficult with each step in this process.
Please stay tuned for opportunities to spread the word about this project amongst our neighbors. Even if the Planning Commission and Select Board produce an ammendment, we will have the opporutunity to bring the issue to a town-wide vote. If we collect petition signature from 5% of Essex residents in the 20 days following the amendment's passage by the Select Board, the vote will happen at the next town meeting day, or during a special election.
The good news is, we've tried gathering petition signatures before, so we know we have the numbers to put this on the ballot. We just need more help going out and knocking on the doors. Please respond to this email if you are interested in helping with canvassing efforts!
Thank you for your support.
3/3/2025
Keep an eye out at the Town Meeting Day polls! We should have a few people in the morning and evening hours, distributing flyers and raising awareness of the State's plans to build a correctional facility in Essex.
February's PC meeting started and ended basically where we left off at the end of 2024. Essex officials have yet to get meaningful answers to questions posed by the commission and us as a community. The consensus of the Planning Commission was that they can't move the zoning ammendment forward without more information around how a correctional facility will impact area first responders, infrastructure needs, real estate, and over all quality of life in Essex. It's not clear the prison project will be discussed in the next meeting, but it's worth keeping an eye on this page for the release of the upcoming agenda.
On February 7th, VT Department of Buildings and General Services, along with the Department of Corrections, gave a presentation to state legislators on the VT HCI detailing the prison project proposal. This was basically a more detailed version of the presentation given to the Essex Planning Commission in the fall of 2024. BGS Commissioner Minoli and DOC Commissioner Deml painted a rosy picture of the state's engagement with the Town of Essex, characterizing the reception of the prison project as "warm", while seeming to indicate that they don't plan on spending much time trying to answer the questions we as a community have asked.
The entire meeting can be viewed on the HCI's youtube page. Near the end of this video, HCI Chair Emmons points out that everyone presenting in the meeting agrees with the plan to build a prison in Essex, and it is important that the committee hears from people who do not agree. So if you don't agree with this project, please send an email explaining why to:
The Essex House delegation also gets a shout-out in the HCI video for their universal support of building the prison in our community. If you would like to reach out to them, please use the contact info here:
2/9/2025
Thanks to everyone who we were able to meet and talk to during our initial petition phase. Unfortunately, we fell about 100 signatures short of the threshold we needed to reach to put a prison question on the 2025 Town Meeting Day ballot. We will have another opportunity when/if the requested zoning changes pass through both the Planning Commission and Select Board in the coming months. We learned a lot through this process and were able to meet a number of people eager to help collect signatures, so we're optimistic about being able to bring this to a vote.
Please send by Wednesday!
community-development@essex.org
The Planning Commission will be reviewing a letter from the VT Department of Buildings and General Services regarding the zoning request, as well as a number of emails and letters sent to the Planning Commission. Over the course of the last two meetings, the PC has received testimony both for and against this proposal. While canvassing, we heard so many reasons why this correctional facility should not be in Essex, so please take some time in the next few days to write an email. Your voice can have a huge impact!
February 13th, 2025 at 6:30pm
81 Main Street, Essex Jct
See full agenda
I know it is hard to make it to these meetings, but maintaining a presence throughout this process can go a long way toward ensuring transparency and open communication between the community and our elected officials. Although our Planning Commission is not in closed door meetings in Montpelier talking about this project, the agencies, non-profits, lobbyists, and prison advocates are. These meetings are happening. There is a lot of money, influence, and political pressure driving this thing. Any decision to shut this down is going to be very tough, if our Planning Commission decides to reject these changes, it will be crucial to really show up in numbers througout the process, to support them in making this difficult decision.
Like we said while gathering signatures, we are at the beginning of a very long process. The Planning Commission does not seem interested in proceeding much without a lot more answers from Montpelier. This doesn't necessarily mean we have to wait for this standoff to be resolved. Based on how long the zoning amendment process takes, we have a window, at least a couple months wide, to be planning for the second petition phase (if we can't convince the PC to reject the proposal in the mean time). Please stay tuned for opportunities to talk about canvassing, meeting engagement, and other opportunities to participate in the democratic process. Please also spread the word with your neighbors, and ask them to sign up for our mailing list.
12/9/2024
Right now we are near the beginning of a very long planning process that will play itself out both here in Essex Town and in Montpelier. Current town zoning regulations prohibit the construction of any correctional facility in the places where the state wants to build. The State has requested zoning regulations be ammended in order to accommodate the facility, and this proposal has been discussed in several in-person and virtual meetings held by the Planning Commission and the Essex Community Justice Center.
Community pushback has been considerable, people have a lot of questions that remain unanswered, including the Planning Commission. During the Planning Commission meeting on 11.14.24, board consensus was that they do not have enough information to proceed with any zoning changes without more information from the DOC, BGS, as well as other communities that host prisons in Vermont. This is essentially where we are, in an information gathering phase. No progress will likely occur until January.
Note regarding Development Review Board / Planning Commission restructure:
The zoning ammendment request will continue to work its way through the Planning Commission in 2025. If the ammendment passes, the new Development Review Board will then take responsibility for reviewing the State of VT's site plan.