By Gina Tron, in the Montpelier Bridge

Editorial note: To protect her safety and dignity, The Bridge is withholding the name of the taxi driver referenced in this story and is identifying her by a pseudonym.

Barre will soon have its first-ever public nudity ordinance, which will go into effect in late April. 

During a March 24 meeting, the Barre City Council introduced the first reading of a public nudity ordinance. During that discussion, Mayor Thom Lauzon noted that Barre has gone more than 200 years without a public nudity ordinance and this would mark a change in that. At an April 7 meeting, they held a second hearing of the ordinance, which the council unanimously adopted. It will be enacted by late April.

Barre City Manager Nicolas Storellicastro confirmed to The Bridge that the ordinance was prompted by an inquiry from “Tara,” who operates a taxi while naked in St. Albans. He said Tara called the clerk’s office and the police department in March asking about applications and permits.

Tara told The Bridge she has no interest or plans to operate in Barre. She said she was merely doing her due diligence in the event she would need to drive a client to Barre. 

“I drive a cab nude in St. Albans and I have signs on my car telling people I’m a nudist,” she said. “I call different places to make sure there are no ordinances. For each city, you have to have a taxi license so I wanted to get registered. What is wrong with me calling the city hall or the cops? I was only being safe.”

Tara said she is houseless and sleeps on the streets. She claimed her vehicle is  inoperable and requires thousands of dollars of repairs. 

“I know the individual has some issues in their personal life that are challenging, but I didn’t know if the goal was to move or expand to Barre,” Storellicastro told The Bridge. “The only thing we had to work on was inquiries on permits and applications to operate here.” 

The city manager added that he didn’t know how serious or capable Tara was about actually operating a taxi business in Barre. 

“We are not expecting this to be a big thing in Barre anyhow, but we want to preempt it anyway,” he said. “It’s an effort to be proactive about an issue and get ahead of it. Is it the biggest societal ill that we’re facing? No, but it’s also one that was relatively easy to address.”

The issue was relatively easy to address largely because officials could draw on Burlington’s recently adopted nudity ordinance. Last fall, Burlington made public nudity illegal after several downtown businesses made complaints about naked individuals. Storellicastro took Burlington’s recent ordinance language, added minor modifications, and brought it to the council. The proposed ordinance in Barre comes with fines, ranging from $100 for the first offense to $500 for the third.

Public nudity is legal in Vermont but publicly undressing is not. These ordinances override that law.

“We have always appreciated Vermont’s ‘live and let live’ spirit and its atmosphere of body acceptance. It’s disappointing when that changes, as is happening here,” Erich Schuttauf, Esq., executive director and general counsel for the American Association for Nude Recreation (AANR) told The Bridge. 

He argued that “making laws to address unique situations usually leads to problem laws. Why change what usually works?”

Storellicastro told The Bridge there have been no recent complaints made to his office about nudity nor official concerns made since the ordinance’s first reading, but Storellicastro knows the ordinance itself has become “a topic of conversation” in the community. The ordinance has prompted several threads on social media, and Tara said she has noticed an increase in harassing messages.

“That’s certainly unfortunate,” Storellicastro said. “For us, it was more just about public decency.”

While the complaints about nudity have been limited, Storellicastro said the ordinance reflects broader concerns about public behavior as more people have been pushed into homelessness. The rollback of the state’s pandemic-era motel voucher program triggered repeated waves of evictions beginning in 2024 and continuing into 2025. This meant hundreds of people had no more temporary shelter at a time when advocates say there is little permanent housing available.

“Last year, we had to do a public defecation ordinance,” Storellicastro said. “These are not the things we want to be dealing with, but they all have impacts and now with more people out on the streets […] this highlighted an issue.”

Tara’s friend Christine Fiorini, a fellow taxi driver and former teacher from Franklin County, told The Bridge that “harassment has definitely escalated since this has been made public and people can identify her.”

Fiorini noted, however, that the harassment, including transphobic comments aimed at Tara — a trans woman — has been going on for much longer than that. In the St. Albans Uncensored Facebook group, threads about Tara date months back, and several commenters mock her gender identity. During a phone interview with Tara, The Bridge could hear at least one person yelling disparaging comments at her from their car.

Fiorini characterizes Tara as “honest to a fault,” as someone who “treats others with respect,” and notes that her pets “are drawn to her.” She said people often take advantage of Tara’s vulnerabilities.

As for the ordinance, Tara said, “It’s up to them (the city council). I don’t even go to Barre. The only time I’ll be in that area will be for the naked bike ride in Montpelier in June.”