Current News

Vermont Business Magazine Common Good Vermont, a recently merged program of United Way of Northwest Vermont, will offer its annual Nonprofit Summer Camp in a virtual format this year on July 28 and August 11. Leaders of all levels from Vermont nonprofits are invited to participate in a series of workshops focusing on reimaging how nonprofit professionals work and lead as we move forward.

Vermont Business Magazine Heidenberg Properties Group (HPG), Downstreet Housing & Community Development and Evernorth have announced the two latest projects that will call Berlin’s New Town Center home: 30-units of affordable workforce housing and Central Vermont’s first Starbucks. Over the past decade, Heidenberg Properties has worked with the Town of Berlin to introduce a variety of mixed uses into the 65-acre Berlin Mall parcel. These have included a Walmart grocery, Kohls department store, Planet Fitness, Passumpsic Bank, and most recently, Chestnut Place, a 98-unit senior housing project which will welcome residents in the first quarter of 2022.

Program to enroll Vermonters in free courses to enhance skills and provide workforce training

Vermont Business Magazine Governor Phil Scott, the University of Vermont and Community College of Vermont today announced the launch of the Upskill Vermont Scholarship Program, which is intended to address the training needs of Vermont’s workforce, specifically for unemployed or underemployed individuals seeking new opportunities through career change or advancement in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic state of emergency. CCV is getting $4.5 million from several different sources of funding. UVM has received $1 million in federal ARPA funds.

Vermont Business Magazine Clean Energy Group (CEG), a national nonprofit that works on clean energy and climate, announced the retirement of Lewis Milford, its founder and president. His retirement will become effective on December 31, 2021. Milford founded CEG in 1998, after working over several years on clean energy and utility restructuring dockets in New England while with the Conservation Law Foundation. With CEG, Milford focused on how state and communities could develop sound renewable energy policies, programs, and finance tools.

Vermont Business Magazine Attorney General TJ Donovan announced that Michael Powers, 27, of Bennington, Vermont, was arraigned today on two felony counts of Promotion of Child Sexual Abuse Materials, seven misdemeanor counts and one felony count of Possession of Child Sexual Abuse Materials, and one count of Resisting Arrest. The investigation was initiated when the VT-ICAC Task Force received CyberTipline Reports from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that an individual was distributing what was suspected to be images of child sexual abuse materials, commonly referred to as “child pornography,” on the Instagram social media platform.

Vermont Business Magazine Governor Phil Scott today announced a series of new pop-up walk-in vaccination clinics available across Vermont this week. Vermont leads the nation in COVID-19 vaccination rates with 82.8 percent of the eligible population already having received at least one dose of vaccine. The Vermont Department of Health is also reporting eight new cases of COVID-19 today and no deaths, which are holding at 258.

Vermont Business Magazine Representative Peter Welch (D-Vermont) and a group of bipartisan Energy and Commerce members - Rep. John Curtis (R-UT), Rep. Doris Matsui (D-CA), Rep. Michael C Burgess (R-TX) - sent a letter Monday to Secretary Xavier Becerra urging the Department of Health and Human Services to work with Congress to develop a comprehensive telehealth strategy for Medicare beneficiaries to continue accessing critical virtual care services following the expiration of the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency (PHE).

Vermont Business Magazine Consolidated Communications (NASDAQ: CNSL), a top 10 fiber provider, is delivering symmetrical, gigabit, fiber internet to more than 30,000 residents and businesses in Barre, Bellows Falls, Brattleboro, Fair Haven, Rutland, West Rutland, Pittsfield, Montpelier and Proctor, Vermont, by end of September.

Vermont Business Magazine Colchester-based Vernal Biosciences, Inc a manufacturer of high purity mRNA for research and clinical use, today announced the closing of a seed round of financing. Alloy Therapeutics led the round and was joined by the Vermont Center for Emerging Technologies and individual angel investors. The proceeds of the financing will be used to scale Vernal’s technical development and commercial operations in Vermont. The Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are mRNA vaccines.

Vermont Business Magazine Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) Monday introduced a comprehensive emergency security supplemental to address the urgent security needs facing the Capitol and the country. The $3.7 billion bill would address the violent insurrection that took place on January 6, provide funding for costs incurred on the Capitol complex and the Department of Defense related to the COVID pandemic, and provide the resources to support our Afghan partners as the United States’ mission winds down.

Vermont Business Magazine Conversations between seriously ill people, their families and palliative care specialists lead to better quality-of-life. Understanding what happens during these conversations - and particularly how they vary by cultural, clinical, and situational contexts - is essential to guide healthcare communication improvement efforts. To gain true understanding, new methods to study conversations in large, inclusive, and multi-site epidemiological studies are required. A new computer model offers an automated and valid tool for such large-scale scientific analyses.

Vermont Business Magazine Southwestern Vermont Council on Aging will be hosting its popular “Powerful Tools for Caregivers” course virtually this summer with a six-week class kicking off on July 23. The course, which is free and offered to caregivers who are caring for family members, friends and neighbors, among others, is designed to give participants the tools to be a highly effective caregiver while also ensuring that they are taking care of themselves as well.