Miro Weinberger walked up to his first legislative hearing Wednesday in Montpelier as Burlington's mayor and took some heat from state lawmakers.
"I'm perplexed by this whole audit," said State Senator John Campbell.
Campbell wasn't happy about a recent report showing Burlington did not pay its share of taxes on a piece of property, the amount, roughly $1-million dollars.
The land was supposed to be fixed up under Mayor Bob Kiss' administration, through a program called TIF.
The program is a way for municipalities to spruce up an area, without paying state taxes.
That's supposed to increase the property value and bring businesses or housing to town.
And the increased value will in turn bring the state more money, once it's taxed again.
The problem in Burlington's case, the property was never spruced up.
Fox44 asked Campbell how this could even happen?
"They were probably sloppy in how they met the regulations. The reporting was certainly at a minimum," said Campbell.
After learning about the problem, Weinberger wants to work with legislators to make sure this doesn't happen again.
"There's some real complexity to it and ambiguity, particularly some of these older districts," said Weinberger.
State lawmakers feel the same way.
Despite a call from Governor Peter Shumlin asking lawmakers to expand the program to include Barre and South Burlington, they want to take a step back, to make sure the program is working properly.
"If the foundation of the program is deficient then I certainly don't think it's in Vermont's best interest to go forward and expanding the cap," said Campbell.
As for those million dollars, Weinberger says city tax payers won't have to pay it.
But Senator Campbell says the attorney general is considering going after the city for that million dollars.
