You are invited to join the Addison County Chamber
of Commerce today for the after hours business mixer which is being held at
Vergennes Opera House. There will be plenty of great door prizes, food &
beverage, plus a chance to win the Pot of Gold—which is valued at $650! The mixer takes place from 5 – 7
PM. If you would like to attend,
please RSVP by sending Sue an email, or calling 388-7591 x2. Learn more by visiting the Chamber’sWebsite.
Compass Music and Arts Center at 333 Jones Drive in
Brandon welcomed its first new staff member this week. Kathryn Marshall has joined the team as
the Exhibit Director and Executive Assistant. As Exhibit Director, Marshall will develop the Phonograph
Museum and manage other displays and exhibits throughout the CMAC building as
renovation work on the former Brandon Training School Building K precedes.
Following the work she has been doing in historic museums, Marshall is excited
to be returning to an arts organization where she can work with local artists
and regional performers. Learn
more about CMAC right now by visiting www.cmacvt.org.
Rachael Miller of Granville, Vermont has been
selected as one of six finalists for the Old Pulteney Maritime Heroes Award. The award recognizes individuals for
their outstanding contributions within the sailing community. She was nominated for connecting and
educating people of all ages on the importance of locating and removing marine
debris in order to maintain a clean, safe sailing environment. A public vote is
being held at www.maritimeheroes.com
though December 16th. The winner
will be honored at a gala event January 23 during U.S. Sailing’s National
Symposium in Clearwater, Florida.
Beginning next summer Middlebury College will
launch a new four-week leadership and innovation program at Sierra Nevada
College located near the shores of Lake Tahoe in Incline Village, Nevada. Called MiddCORE Immersion, it is open
to students and recent graduates from any college or university and will take
place June 17-July 12. The new program features mentors, ranging from CEOs,
politicians and entrepreneurs to artists and actors, who will provide students
with intensive hands-on challenges and skill-building workshops.
The Public Service Board has signed off on a
liquefied natural gas storage facility for Omya Inc., a decision that will
allow the company to switch from more expensive No. 2 fuel oil to run its
Pittsford calcium carbonate plant.
The tanks will be built within a “concrete impoundment area” capable of
containing all 120,000 gallons in case of a spill. Jim Stewart is the Omya
plant manager and said yesterday that with the CPG in hand the next step is to
complete the final design and submit that to the PSB for approval. Stewart
estimated that the $8 million LNG facility would be built and online a year
from now.
Almost two weeks after they headed south to help
those hardest hit by Hurricane Sandy, Green Mountain Power crews are back home
in Vermont. The teams began in
Connecticut. After about 10 days they headed to Staten Island, and then
Yonkers. The crew of about 70 worked long hours for 13 days straight. They say
they were surprised at the outpouring of support they received from residents
in the tri-state area. In fact, when they walked into a restaurant to grab a
quick bite to eat, they got applause.
They said the most challenging part of the trip was dealing with New
York traffic.
Police are looking for information regarding stolen
firewood missing from a Killington home.
Helen Mercer told police an entire cord of firewood has gone missing.
She told police her wood had been disappearing from her property since October 14. Anyone with information is encouraged
to contact the Vermont State Police in Rutland at 802-773-9101. Information can
also be submitted anonymously online at www.vtips.info
or text “CRIMES” (274637) to Keyword: VTIPS
The Essex County Fair Board is holding a public
hearing at 7 PM on Monday November 26th to get suggestions for the 2013 fair. The fair dates have been set for July
31st to August 4th. The board would like to hear any suggestions for shows,
fundraising, carnivals and so on. The
meeting is at the Cornell Cooperative Extension Building in Westport.
Refreshments will be served. The
annual membership meeting will be held at 7 PM Monday December 3rd at the
Cooperative Extension Building. If anyone is interested in becoming a Fair
Board member, contact the fair by email: countyfairfun@yahoo.com
and use the subject: board member. The vote will be that evening. Each year, five board member positions
are up for election.
The 2013 town of Schroon budget exceeds the state’s
2 percent tax cap. Supervisor Mike Marnell said Trustees voted to surpass the
cap with little debate. State law allows a municipality to top the cap with a
60 percent vote of its board. The 2013 Schroon budget totals $4,285,537. To
meet the state’s 2 percent tax cap, Schroon’s town board could only raise taxes
by $55,396. It would mean cutting another $121,637 from the budget.
A skunk killed in the town of Peru has tested
positive for rabies. That brings the
total confirmed rabid animals in Clinton County to six for the year: one bat,
one raccoon and four skunks. The third and fourth skunks were reported within
two days of each other, on November 4th and 6th. Rabies was also present in Essex County this year. The wild
animals testing positive for rabies most frequently in New York are raccoons,
skunks and bats. In the North Country, the cat is the domestic animal most
likely to be infected with rabies.
Public tobacco-free policies have proven successful
in helping to reduce the number of people addicted to tobacco. As the nation focuses on smoking
cessation during the 37th-annual Great American Smokeout today, the Adirondack
Tobacco-Free Network continues to offer its support in helping curb the
addiction. The Tobacco-Free Network has worked with government seats in
Clinton, Franklin and Essex counties and is offering its support to the
region’s universities and colleges, which may be considering tobacco-free policies.
It's official: Long-time state Rep. Paul Poirier of
Barre is running for speaker of the Vermont House. The former Democrat, now an
independent, says he's challenging incumbent Democratic Speaker Shap Smith
because he believes Smith is too conservative and runs the House in too
autocratic a fashion.
The Brattleboro Retreat psychiatric hospital is
cutting 31 jobs. The move comes two days after unionized workers held an
informational picket. Retreat
officials say 31 positions will be cut due to projected deficits this year and
next year. Retreat Senior Vice
President of Government Relations Peter Albert said yesterday that the cuts
would be to both administrative and clinical jobs and affect both nonunion and
union positions. Unionized workers
held an informational picket on Monday over what the union calls deteriorating
contract talks.
A Florida sheriff says a suspect in a 2001 killing
in that state has been arrested in Vermont. Charlotte County Sheriff Bill
Cameron says Philip Barr was arrested at about ten yesterday morning in
Hardwick. Cameron says Barr attempted to flee when U.S. Marshals approached the
house on Pine Drive, but he was captured without incident.
A New York senator says the state's plan to choose
the high bidder to produce driver's licenses with black & white images is
unacceptable, while the state defended the choice for the first time. Sen. Mark Grisanti said that the state
should be required to find in-state, or at least domestic, firms to handle
large contracts. Sources say that
state has tentatively selected a Canadian company for a contract that would
cost $38 million more than the current vendor. The State motor vehicles Commissioner says her department
has tentatively selected the highest bidder because the company offered the
most secure document. She says that driver's licenses will serve as a kind of
national identification card and must be secure from tampering and fraud.
Brandon Music on Country Club Road in Brandon will
present vocalist Andrea Wolper this Thursday evening at 7:30. Andrea appears in
clubs, festivals and concert halls in the U.S. and internationally. General
Admission is $15. Brandon MusicCafé offers a concert and dinner package, which includes dinner and a ticket to
the show for $30 plus tax per person.
For Information & Reservations (802) 465-4071 / info@brandon-music.net
The Sound Investment Jazz Ensemble and the
Middlebury Swing Dance Club are coming together for a fantastic evening of
swing this Friday evening. The
event runs from 9 to 11 PM at the McCullough Social Space on campus. Call 443-3168 for directions and
details.
Here’s a reminder that the second installment of
the Town Of Middlebury Property Taxes are due today.
The Rutland School Board is considering a bond to
cover five years’ worth of delayed work that is expected to cost $3.3 million
for fiscal year 2014. The amount
of deferred work in the proposed budget compared to last year’s budget is up
more than 28 percent. The FY2014 capital maintenance budget was up 13 percent
over last fiscal year’s budget, with the biggest expenses being the purchase of
two new school buses, a snow blower and a platform lift.
Oxbow Union High School parents packed the school
Wednesday night, demanding answers from school administrators after a popular
coach was arrested. Earlier this
month, long-time girls varsity sports coach Brian Musty was accused of having a
three-year-long sexual relationship with a 15-year-old female student beginning
in 1997. Parents say they had
raised concerns about the coach's behavior, saying he had acted inappropriately
around students. Administrators
deny getting the complaints, adding they had no idea the arrest was coming.
A young woman from Vermont is in critical condition
in London, England after being struck by a car. Amy Werner, who is 23 and from West Dover was walking on the
pavement in West Hampstead, England when she and another woman were struck by a
car driven by an 83-year-old woman.
Werner suffered severe head trauma and several broken bones while her
friend walking with her died.
Werner's father is a police investigator and the fire chief in West
Dover, and her parents are now in London with their daughter. Werner's hometown is planning
fundraisers this Sunday at the West Dover Inn to help pay for travel expenses.
A group of staff members at the University of
Vermont are saying "no" to joining a union. Technicians, research and library support staff, along with
others earning overtime at the university voted overwhelmingly to stay
non-union. Other groups on campus,
including school faculty are unionized, and the decision before the staffers
was to join the N-E-A or no union at all.
The N-E-A says it’s disappointed by the vote, but will still work to
bring more staff into the union.
Love letters from World War II written by a New
Jersey woman to her boyfriend in Vermont washed ashore during Superstorm Sandy. A 14-year-old found the 57 letters
inside a box walking along a beach in Atlantic Highlands the day after Sandy
struck. They chronicled life for Dorothy Fallon and Lynn Farnham from 1942
until the week before they married in 1948. It's believed the letters floated from the Rumson area down
the Shrewsbury River into Sandy Hook Bay.
Lynn passed away in 1991 and Dorothy is in frail health in Asbury Park.
An in-depth report shows bullying is on the rise in
Vermont. More students than ever before are harassing others. But there is good
news here too; more is being done about the growing problem. "One child who gets bullied or
harassed is great statistically, but if you're that one child or that one
parent of the child, it's not good enough," Department of Education
Commissioner Armando Vilaseca said.
So the fact that there were more than 19-hundred incidents reported in
Vermont schools last year is a problem. Even though that number is too high,
it's actually only a slight up tick.
"It's about two percent per year," Dept. of Ed. Business
Analyst, Mike Bailey said. Schools
are required to report student misconduct annually, and with that data, the
Department of Education looks at patterns and trends to see how schools can
better respond and provide support for the victim and the bully. "The goal is to always protect
kids so that they feel like they can go to school, get a good education,"
Commissioner Vilaseca said. Boys
in grades six through eight are responsible for the most incidents; anything
from perceived sexual orientation, weight or race make some students a target. Students at Montpelier High School say
bullying isn't really a problem, they're proud of their tolerant state and
school but the only thing they could come up with is a little bit of rivalry
between the seniors and the freshman.
"They're less mature and there's more of this gossipy stuff and I
know that we were there at one point," Students, Allison Lau and Sammy
Rivera said. So as more students
learn to accept and respect their peers, we can turn these statistics around. Recently, a harassment, hazing and
bullying advisory council was formed to come up with more solutions. It's important to be a good role model too;
the Commissioner says society should have equal expectations about what's
happening in the community as it does about what's happening in schools.
Queen city leaders are in New York as we speak talking
with world leaders on how it can become a smarter city. In a news conference yesterday morning Burlington
accepted the "IBM smarter cities challenge grant". Next year, an IBM team will arrive in Burlington
helping it to become an even better, greener place to live. For example IBM could help take the
city's new advanced meter system to the next level. "The city of Burlington and Burlington electric will
benefit from this innovation grant, in my mind it means whatever we come up
with will be available for the rest of the state." mayor Miro Weinberger
and others are in New York at a summit with the other winning cities. Burlington is the second smallest city in
the world, to have won the grant.
GE Healthcare says it is laying off 10% of its
staff in South Burlington. The
company released a statement that says, "While GE Healthcare regrets the
loss of any job, the business needs to make tough decisions in the current
economic climate." This comes
after several rounds of cuts at GE in South Burlington, including as recently
as March. GE went on to say,
"While these types of decisions are never easy in the near term, we are
confident that they are necessary to meet the current and future needs of our
customers." The company
didn't say the exact number of employees that would be affected.
