Current News

Vermont Business Magazine The Peck Company Holdings, Inc (NASDAQ: PECK), a leading commercial solar engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) company in South Burlington, has signed a 5.3MW contract in Rhode Island, from a long time customer. The $7.256 million contract for a project located in Rhode Island is targeted to be completed in the first quarter of 2021.

Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Department of Public Safety announced this week that Maine-based Wireless Partners has received a $762,000 grant to connect 823 locations in the Northeast Kingdom to 5G cellular and broadband. The grant was awarded as part of the state’s COVID-19 Emergency Connectivity Initiative and Get Vermonters Connected Now Initiative. The PSD has issued $12 million in grants in three rounds of the broadband initiative.

VBSR The EPIC Education Series is an 8-part series of 2-hour interactive virtual roundtable workshops that will address some of the most pressing issues of our time around ethics, leadership, and governance. Participating companies will have the unique opportunity to delve into anti-racism, business resiliency, and climate crisis in one comprehensive learning experience.

The EPIC (Ethical Performance Improvement Campaign) Education Series was designed by Abundant Sun and VBSR to help organizations improve their overall ethical performance in order to hit their strategic goals around business growth. The Series will run from October 2020 - March 2021 and be limited to an inaugural cohort of 12 participating companies and organizations.

Vermont Business Magazine Governor Phil Scott announced final action Wednesday evening on a range of bills, including the Legislature’s bill to create a regulated cannabis (marijuana) market in Vermont, which will be allowed to go into law without his signature. He also allowed the use-of-force policing bill to become law without his signature. In addition, he signed into law the racial equity bill, two other law enforcement bills, and the front-line hazard pay bill.

Vermont becomes the 11th state to legalize, regulate, and tax cannabis sales.

Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Department of Health reported today that there were six new cases of COVID-19. Eight months into the pandemic, terms that were once unfamiliar have become a part of our everyday language — contact tracing, infectious periods, serology, quarantine. We are always working on resources to help Vermonters understand exactly what these terms mean.

Vermont Business Magazine OneCare Vermont, the state’s accountable care organization (ACO) announced today key results of their 2019 Medicare program. Participating providers earned a total of $11.3 million in Medicare shared savings from collaborative work to improve beneficiaries’ outcomes and overall health of the Medicare population. Additionally, OneCare Vermont participating providers collectively achieved a Medicare quality performance score of 91.88 percent for the year.

Vermont Business Magazine A new study from the Business Roundtable in Washington, DC, finds that international trade supported 91,000 jobs in Vermont in 2018, having represented more than 1 out of every 5 jobs in the state before the pandemic. Since 1992, before the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the share of jobs tied to trade in Vermont has increased by 96 percent. Additionally, the Green Mountain State's trade-related employment grew five times faster than total state employment from 1992 to 2018.

Vermont Business Magazine New Charter Technologies, a portfolio company of Palo Alto based private equity firm Oval Partners, today announced the acquisition of South Burlington, Vermont based Managed Services Provider, The Tech Group. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Vermont Business Magazine The Champlain Housing Trust and Steps to End Domestic Violence jointly announced plans to establish a new shelter serving those escaping domestic and sexual violence in Chittenden County. CHT acquired the property with Coronavirus Relief Funds made available in the CARES Act, which were allocated by the State Legislature through the Vermont Housing & Conservation Board. CHT has hired JA Morrissey to renovate what had been the Handy’s Extended Stay Suites on Route 15 in Colchester, and will be leasing it to Steps.

Agency of Commerce & Community Development The Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) has reopened three more branch offices, in Bennington, Newport, and Springfield. The openings to the public are by appointment only using the new online scheduling system. The hours of operation for appointments at these three locations, in addition to the branch office locations already open in Montpelier, South Burlington, and Rutland, will be 8 am to 4 pm.

Visit the DMV website for full details and information on the reopening.

Vermont Business Magazine Vermont’s Legislature passed HCR337 designating October 6, 2020, as Vermont Mask Day. The initiative was led by Doug Altshuler, founder of Masks4Missions, a nonprofit organization that partners with Vermont nonprofits to design, make, distribute, and sell subsidized COVID-19 masks bearing images from its nonprofit partners .

Founded only two months ago, Masks4Missions is the proud organizer of Vermont Mask Day , a state-wide celebration of Vermonters coming together virtually and in mask-protected, socially-distant gatherings to celebrate our shared commitment to healthy communities. Vermont Mask Day will be celebrated as a week of events (October 5-9th), with varied creative activities across the state with nonprofit partners, including Burlington City Arts, Vermont Food Bank, and many others.

Vermont Business Magazine In recognition of its extraordinary community engagement initiatives, the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU) today named the University of Vermont a regional winner of the 2020 W.K. Kellogg Foundation Community Engagement Scholarship Award. As a regional winner, UVM will compete for the national C. Peter Magrath Community Engagement Scholarship Award, which will be announced in November. Other finalists for the award are the University of Memphis, The Ohio State University and the University of Utah.