The Monkton selectboard unanimously approved a memorandum of
understanding with Vermont Gas Systems at a hastily scheduled special meeting
last night. The board had rejected an
earlier draft of the agreement in a 3-2 decision just nine days earlier. The revised memorandum struck out language
that explicitly endorsed VGS’s Addison Natural Gas Project and added some
clarifying language to existing provisions.
The memorandum will be filed as an amendment to VGS’s application for a
certificate of public good from the Pubic Service Board.
Investigators say a Lincoln
woman got farm loans and then started unloading property and equipment used to
secure the loans. Lori Russell pleaded
guilty to conspiracy to defraud the United
States .
Court records show she applied for over $500,000 in loans from the Farm
Service Agency and Vermont Agricultural Credit Corporation. She lied on her applications and started
selling items the day after the loans closed.
She's on probation and must pay about $200,000 back.
All three members of the Vermont
congressional delegation are offering proposals to limit the government's
surveillance powers. Senator Bernie
Sanders is proposing a bill to limit the FBI and the NSA's power to track
citizen phone calls in terror probes.
Senator Patrick Leahy has offered a bill that would declassify court
opinions that show how the government interprets the law in granting
surveillance orders. Congressman Peter
Welch has offered a bill to set a higher legal standard for authorizing
surveillance.
Vermont State Police responded to a suspicious complaint in New
Haven on Sunday.
According to reports, 72-year-old David Millson of New
Haven was cited to appear in court on August 5 on
charges of reckless endangerment and aiming a firearm at another, 26-year-old
Bradley Sprague of Weybridge. The police
investigation suggests that Millson discharged between nine and 12 rounds less
then 500 feet away, in the direction of Sprague. Millson told troopers that he was attempting
to get Sprague's attention to get him to stop cutting his neighbor’s trees
which separate the two properties.
A former state police trooper in prison for padding his time
sheets will never serve as a police officer again in Vermont . The Vermont Criminal Justice Training Council
voted to decertify Jim Deeghan as a police officer. Deeghan is the first full-time police officer
to be decertified in the state. He has not contested the decertification. Deeghan is currently serving two years in
prison and must pay $200,000 in restitution.
Senator Bernie Sanders says a new report released today by
the Joint Economic Committee showed the average student loan debt in Vermont
was greater than the amount in all but six other states. New Hampshire 's
was by far the highest at over $33,000. In
Vermont , 63 percent of college
graduates hold student loans. The
average balance is $28,000. That debt
load amounts to 82 percent of the average annual income for recent graduates, a
ratio of debt to earnings that ranks Vermont
the highest in the nation and the only state over 80 percent.
