Monday, December 1, 2014

WVTK Local & State News December 1, 2014

Vergennes Union High School students will have another day off tomorrow. On Friday, a steam pipe leak caused some damage. Officials were on hand today doing air quality tests. JoAn Canning, Superintendent of Schools, says classroom re-locations and moving of materials and equipment is taking longer than expected. So all classes at VUHS are cancelled for tomorrow. Students who attend outside school placements will not be provided with transportation but if parents or students can transport, by all means they are encouraged to do so. You can contact the Superintendent's Office if you have any questions or concerns.

Vermont's rollout of universal pre-kindergarten is being delayed by a year. State education officials say challenges with school budgets and establishing rules for the program are causing the delay. The program was supposed to begin in the fall of 2015, but it is now scheduled for one year later. State education officials last week notified school districts to budget for the programs beginning with the 2016-2017 school year.

The Vermont Attorney General’s Office is warning you about a IRS phone scam. According to reports, a number of residents have reported receiving calls from either a recorded robocalls or live phone calls from persons identifying themselves as IRS agents. The caller then threatens legal action if an alleged outstanding debt is not paid immediately. The bogus IRS agent then directs the resident to call another phone number to make an immediate payment by credit card or other direct means of payment. Officials say this is a scam.

Vermont officials are investigating an outage that affected the state's 911 coverage for six hours on Friday. The state did not immediately realize the problem, which was apparently caused by a weather-related fiber optical line failure. While some calls did get through, around 45 callers were not able to reach a 911 operator. The state received a list of calls that didn't get through Saturday and began reaching out to those people.

U.S. Representative Peter Welch is urging farmers to sign up for the new dairy insurance program under the latest Farm Bill. A press release says the last day to enroll in the Margin Protection Program (MPP) is December 5. The program is a federal safety net that's available for dairy farmers when milk prices fall. MPP information is available through: Local FSA offices throughout Vermont, the UVM Extension Service, and online at fsa.usda.gov. Farmers who do not enroll by Friday will not have another opportunity to do so until July 2015.