WVTK Local & State News October 14, 2011

A small section of Vermont Route 30 in Hubbardton is closed so repairs can be made to culvert that was heavily damaged by the remnants of Hurricane Irene. Work will be completed by this evening. The road continues to be closed to all traffic today.

This Sunday the American Cancer Society’s “Making Strides Against Breast Cancer” Walk takes place at Dorset Park in South Burlington. There is only one Strides event for the entire state and this is it! This 5-mile walk is not a race; it is a celebration of survivorship, an occasion to express hope, and a shared goal to end a disease that threatens the lives of so many people we love. Amanda Leigh is team leader for WVTpinK! Help her get to her $1,000 goal today by making a donation right now or join her for the walk on Sunday! Get the scoop HERE!

A family has been left homeless after a fire destroyed their house in Bristol. It happened Wednesday night on Route 116. Fire officials say no one was home at the time and nobody was injured. Investigators are still trying to figure out what caused the blaze.

A former Vermont elementary school teacher has pleaded guilty to one count of possession of child pornography. A federal judge on Thursday ordered 29-year-old Will Parini of Starksboro detained pending sentencing. Federal prosecutors say court records show Parini traded indecent images through email with a person in San Antonio, Texas, in August and September of 2010. The U.S. Attorney's office says he distributed about 200 images and received about 19 during the two months.

The Middlebury select-board unanimously agreed to lease an acre of town property to a nonprofit group to house a small solar farm for the next 25 years. The lease was struck with a “Acorn Energy One Solar LLC” for an acre of land located north and a little west of the Middlebury police station. The property is slated to host a 650-panel, 150-kilowatt solar array that is expected to generate around 172,500 kilowatt-hours of electricity each year. That is enough to provide electricity to 30 average homes.

The Vermont Supreme Court will convene for the first time in modern history in Addison County. The five justices will hear six cases and offer local citizens a first-hand glimpse into the workings of the state’s highest Court. The one-day visit next Tuesday is in line with the VSC’s annual custom of occasionally presiding in venues outside of its usual courtroom in Montpelier. The VSC makes a working visit each spring to the Vermont Law School and a visit each fall to a county courthouse, which has taken place for the past 25 years.

Artist Patrick Dougherty’s “So Inclined” sculpture on the Middlebury College campus will be dismantled. The sculpture materials will be recycled into compost, and returned to the earth as a supplement for campus plantings. He will return to campus on Friday October 28th and discuss his worldwide projects and commissions in a 4:30PM talk in Room 221 of the Mahaney Center for the Arts. The lecture is free and open to the public.

The Vergennes Union High School class of 2012 set a new fund-raising record for the seniors’ annual walk for charity this week. On Tuesday the class presented a check for more than $6,000 to the Child Life Services program at Vermont Children’s Hospital, which is a division of Fletcher Allen Health Care.

This weekend the sport of Quidditch will come home to Middlebury. This is where “non-wizard” humans first played the game seven years ago. It all starts Sunday at 9AM. Besides bringing Quidditch back to Middlebury, the tournament will also be a fundraiser for disaster relief efforts for the devastation caused by Tropical Storm Irene. The event is free and open to the public, but a $5 donation is recommended. It will go to the Vermont Disaster Relief Fund. In addition, all traveling teams have been encouraged to raise funds for relief efforts.

Officials say it could be another month before Vermont authorities determine the cause of death of a woman who died while trying to rob a Vergennes convenience store. The office of Vermont's Chief Medical Examiner is still waiting for results of toxicology tests. Police were called to a Vergennes convenience store on September 28th after receiving a report of a robbery and she was found unresponsive after the store clerk had restrained her while waiting for police. She was later pronounced dead at a hospital.

Two teenagers have been jailed after their arrest for burglarizing a popular Moriah bar. Moriah Town Police arrested 19-Year-Old Daryk Budwick and 18-Year-Old Ryan LaMour both of Moriah, for felony third-degree burglary. Police said the pair went to the Old Mine in the hamlet of Moriah Center sometime late September 26th or early the 27th and used a ladder to climb in through a window.

Two Adirondack towns are taking part in a pilot program designed to cut energy use and save money. The towns of Moriah and Schroon Lake will begin by taking a close inventory of energy use for municipally owned buildings and vehicles. Town officials will then come up with energy-saving plans, track the savings and share their experiences with other communities. The Moriah Supervisor says that with small upfront investments, the town can save more than enough money to pay for the changes. The project is funded through the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority and U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development.

The Green Mountain Club welcomed the news that the U.S. Forest Service has reopened the last stretch of the Long Trail closed in Vermont. Due to damage from tropical storm Irene, three miles of trail in Shrewsbury remained closed for a month, weeks after the rest of the Long Trail reopened following the forest closure.

Vermont state officials say costs of recovering from Tropical Storm Irene now are projected to reach $935 million, with most paid by the federal government but the state still left to pay between $80 million and $170 million. How much the state will have to pay depends on whether the Congress will authorize the U.S. Department of Transportation to waive a $100 million cap on disaster aid.

Gov. Peter Shumlin says he'll assemble an advisory committee to develop a plan for whether to rebuild or move all or part of the state office complex in Waterbury, which was flooded by Tropical Storm Irene. The complex housed about 1,500 workers in a range of state agencies. Only a small part of it - that houses the Department of Public Safety - has been able to reopen. Shumlin said Thursday his administration is weighing three main options: refurbishing and reopening the complex where it is now in an area he fears is prone to future flooding; creating a new state building or campus elsewhere; or some blend of the two. He says the Legislature needs to be consulted, and that he hopes to have a decision by spring.

A top Vermont state official says the state is looking at multiple regional secure psychiatric hospitals to replace the flooded state hospital in Waterbury. Administration Secretary Jeb Spaulding says Gov. Peter Shumlin and his aides are in agreement that no attempt should be made to reopen the antiquated state hospital, which was closed by flooding during Tropical Storm Irene. He says the state currently is negotiating with more than one entity for possible locations for psychiatric facilities.

2011 marks the 10th anniversary of Vermont's "Safe At Home" program, which offers ‘address confidentiality' services to victims of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking. The program provides victims of abuse a substitute address as well as a protected records service, which limits access to public information. Secretary of State Jim Condos says the program offers a clear path for someone to be protected without fear of retribution. Vermont was one of the earliest implementers of a confidentiality program. There are now 32 programs across the country.

Vermont's Shelburne Museum is launching a $14 million capital campaign to build a new center for art and education that will allow the museum to stay open year round. Officials announced plans for the 16,000-square-foot center on Thursday. The center will include galleries, an auditorium and classroom space and will accommodate a year-round calendar of exhibitions and programs for youth and adult audiences. Currently, the museum's 39-building campus is open from mid-May to the end of October.

At Addison Central School some students are learning key skills for the Internet age like principles of digital citizenship to managing a personal password. The kids are getting the opportunity to so this with the help of their own net-book computers. This year, each student in fourth, fifth and sixth grade at the school has the use of a net-book, which the school purchased using a grant from the Digital Wish Foundation. The students can take the laptops home at the end of the day, and when they bring it back to school they hook up to a projector at the front of the room and share their work with the class. Classrooms all across the county are incorporating technology like this into teaching and administration.

A move to expand the Empire State Winter Games in 2012 moves the competition date to the first weekend in February. The organizing committee, comprised of civic, municipal and winter-sport leaders, also established a new look for the statewide winter sports competition. A white snowflake splayed across a red-and-blue border emblazons the tag above the words: Adirondacks, USA. This will be the second year the northern Essex County region in the Adirondacks will host the games.

A Toronto-based airline will offer seasonal service to Vermont this winter. Porter Airlines said that the new service from Toronto to the Burlington International Airport would expand options for skiing for its passengers. The twice-weekly roundtrip flights start December 15th and run until April 8th. They will be offered on Thursdays and Sundays except on long weekends when Monday flights will be provided. One-way fares start as low as $99. Vermont's congressional delegation wrote to Porter Airlines this summer inviting them to fly to Burlington. Gov. Peter Shumlin says the flights will provide an economic boost to Vermont's ski areas and the local economy.