WVTK Local & State News May 3, 2013

Governor Peter Shumlin held a Green Up Day press conference today.  The governor joined agency of transportation workers who picked up trash on I-89 South to promote Green Up Day.  Green Up Day occurs across the state of Vermont all day on Saturday.

Tomorrow morning there will be two short-term road closures to make the Middlebury Maple Run foot race safe for participants and drivers:  From 8:55 - 9:15 AM: South Street from Porter Hospital to Main Street and the intersections of Route 30/Academy Street/College Street/Weybridge Street. Once all the runners have cleared the College Street/Weybridge Street intersection the road will be reopened.  And then from 9:45 - 11:30 AM: South Street and South Street Extension from Porter Field Road to the intersection of Morse Road. Residents and emergency vehicles will be permitted to pass.

A head-on crash closed part of Route 7 in Middlebury yesterday.  Police say a car crossed the center line and hit an agricultural truck.  A woman in the car was taken to the hospital.  The southbound lane was closed for about an hour.  No word on what caused the car to lose control.

Police responded to Hazen Union School today for a report of a student on a bus arriving to the school with a gun.  According to police, the school was immediately placed on lockdown.  Through their investigation, police determined that a gun wasn't on the school bus.  Police say the incident was the result of miscommunication resulting from shotgun shells being found on the school bus earlier in the week.

Last week's drug take back day was a success.  Vermonters helped keep more than 2,300 pounds of prescription pills off the streets.  New Hampshire dropped more than 5,600.  Of the six New England states, Maine led the charge. In total, New England contributed around 30 tons of drugs.  A press release says the National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day aims to provide a safe, convenient, and responsible means of disposing of prescription drugs, while also educating the general public about the potential for abuse of medications.

There have been a lot of wild brush fires around our region of late, but one burning in Colchester earlier today was started intentionally by firefighters.  A 15-acre section of the Vermont National Guard's Camp Johnson is being torched as part of an effort to restore a rare species of pine tree that needs fire to release the seeds from the pinecone.  The Oak-Pine Sandplain at the camp is one of the last of its kind in Vermont.

State transportation officials say they've postponed a project to repair the slopes along one of the main roads in the Adirondack Mountains.  Department of Transportation officials announced last night that the work scheduled for Route 73 in Essex County has been put on hold after the discovery of a fiber-optic cable line in an unexpected location.  The work hasn't been rescheduled yet. Lane closures were originally scheduled to begin earlier this week and the project was to be finished by Memorial Day weekend.