In keeping with a long history of striving to preserve its traditional settlement pattern and promote smart growth, Vermont's most recent growth management policies encourage municipalities to plan for and accommodate development in dense, mixed-use growth centers. However, concentrating development in this manner requires a level of wastewater treatment capacity that is absent in a majority of Vermont municipalities and in nearly half of Vermont's existing designated village centers. It is certainly true that wastewater treatment capacity is neither the only nor the most critical barrier to implementing the growth center concept in Vermont. Nonetheless, it is an obstacle that Vermont must address if it wishes to see its smart growth goals fulfilled statewide, including in unsewered towns that are experiencing development pressure and need to increase their wastewater treatment capacity to accommodate such development in their growth centers. The State is currently developing a publication and trainings to educate local decision-makers about wastewater treatment problems and the range of possible conventional and alternative solutions.
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