Morristown planner: Business owner ‘injured’ downtown

In December, Thomas returned the membership check for Power Play Sports, a longtime MACC member whose owner, Caleb Magoon, used to be the alliance’s president.

Along with the check, Thomas wrote a strongly worded note, handwritten on a piece of U.S. Golf Association stationery emblazoned with a capital T monogram. Thomas confirmed this week that he did write the note, and it is signed with his name.

“Hi Caleb,” the note reads. “I am returning your membership cheque. As MACC’s treasurer, I don’t feel I can accept it. MACC’s mission is to promote and improve downtown Morrisville. You have actively and knowingly injured our downtown. In my opinion, you are the main reason we no longer have a designated downtown.”

“Designated Downtown” is a community revitalization program offered through the Vermont Agency of Commerce and Community Development.

Magoon said this week that, as chairman of the Lamoille County Planning Commission and as an “anchor tenant” business owner, he has fought hard to keep Morrisville’s designation and keep the town economically viable.

“The health of the downtown is integral to the health of my business and I find it deeply hurtful that he would say that to me,” Magoon said.

Return to sender

Magoon said he tried in mid-December to give MACC two checks, one for his membership and one to pay for an art project being done in collaboration between River Arts and Peoples Academy.

He said Thomas returned both checks to his store, located next door to the Morristown municipal offices.

Magoon then tried mailing the checks and, a few days later, Thomas once again returned the membership check, along with his handwritten note.

Also in the note, Thomas explains he kept the $100 check for the River Arts project, but only because the project was over. He said future projects like this would be open only to members.

“If you would like to discuss this with me in greater detail, please stop by my office,” the note concludes.

On Monday, when the News & Citizen reached Thomas by phone in his office to discuss the matter, he said, “I’m not wasting taxpayer time talking about what I do for nonprofits.”

He added, “There’s no public nexus here.”

Morristown town administrator Dan Lindley, when asked Wednesday if he’d previously seen the note, said he’d “heard about it.”

Lindley — Thomas’s boss — said he doesn’t think Thomas’s actions violate any of the town’s personal conduct policies. He said town officials do a variety of other business outside of their job, like coaching basketball teams or serving on nonprofits.

“MACC is a private entity, although they are intertwined” with the town’s economic development goals, Lindley said.

Still, the nonprofit has the same physical and post office addresses as the town, and its meetings are held in the municipal offices. And two highly-placed town officials, Thomas and economic development coordinator Tricia Follert, are also two of MACC’s highest-placed officers; Follert is its president.

Downtown Designation

The Downtown Designation program, according to its website, “has provided communities with financial incentives, training and technical assistance supporting local efforts to restore historic buildings, improve housing, design walkable communities and encourage economic development by incentivizing public and private investments.”

Thomas is incorrect in blaming Magoon for the town losing its designation. It was actually the result of a joint town and village decision to leave the Lamoille County Planning Commission in September 2016.

The state requires designated downtowns to be part of a regional planning commission.

Even MACC’s own meeting minutes support this narrative. From the November 2016 meeting: “Morristown’s status as a Designated Downtown will expire next week due to a decision made by the Morristown Select Board and the Village Trustees to leave the Lamoille County Planning Commission.”

The split from the regional commission — whose offices are directly across the street from the Morristown municipal offices — came after years of infighting between the Morristown and village representatives on the board and the rest of the commission. Thomas was the village representative, and Follert represented the town.

At the time, Magoon called the split “extremely disappointing,” adding, “We don’t want to see our region fractured in this way.”

What’s striking about blaming Magoon for the town’s loss of downtown designation is that Thomas has publicly downplayed the loss. Two years ago, he told the News & Citizen, “I am not overly concerned about losing downtown designation.”

Follert, at the time, echoed that sentiment, and reiterated it Monday in an email: “I still do not see it is a big deal.”

Magoon said Monday he knows “a lot of people are worried about the loss of downtown designation.” His primary concern, he said, is that Thomas isn’t just falsely blaming him, but that he’s telling other business owners and community members that it’s Magoon’s fault.

‘Injured our downtown’

Magoon took umbrage at Thomas’s assertions that he “actively and knowingly injured our downtown.”

“Far from it,” he said. “The best part of my job is being connected to my community, and every day someone walks through my door and I have conversations with them, about all kinds of things.”

Magoon said he chose to buy Power Play in 2011 — he’d worked there in his youth — to help a town that was in bad shape after the nationwide economic recession. He was even MACC president until 2015, when Follert took over.

He’s also on the board of the Vermont Main Street Alliance, whose mission is to “elevate the voices of small business owners on important public policy issues in Vermont.”

Members only?

Thomas denied that he revoked Power Play’s membership, saying he doesn’t have the power to do that.

His explanation for returning the check? He didn’t “think it was right” to hold on to a check before the next MACC meeting, which was originally scheduled for mid-January but bumped back twice to this Monday, Feb. 25.

At Monday’s meeting, the board quietly added Power Play to the list of 75 members who were listed as members as of the end of 2018. There was no discussion about Thomas’s note to Magoon.

The big question is why Power Play Sports was not included as a member.

Thomas, in an email Feb. 13, said it had been “a few years” since Power Play was a member. And on Monday, he said Power Play left MACC in 2015.

But a screenshot of the old MACC website from April 2017 shows Power Play Sports in its members section.

Magoon said the check that Thomas returned was for his 2018 membership, months later than usual but in 2018, nonetheless. Thomas and Follert said Magoon hadn’t submitted a membership application, and Thomas pointed to MACC bylaws that require members to re-up every three years.

Follert said the Alliance was running a “rejoin now campaign,” which gave new members who joined in 2018 credit for their 2019 memberships.

Did anyone from MACC tell Magoon he was no longer a member?

“Other than the note, no,” he said. “I took it as he was making a decision that I wasn’t gonna be a member.”

Magoon showed the News & Citizen screenshots of Power Play’s ledger sheets going back five years, which show membership checks to MACC written in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. All four checks were cashed.

“I don’t think that’s true,” Thomas said Monday. “I don’t have that in our recordkeeping.”

When reminded that he was the MACC treasurer, and therefore ought to be the one keeping track of this, he said, “I guess you’re stuck with me,” and declined to answer any more questions.