Current News

Vermont Business Magazine US Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) announced on Wednesday that his office will again organize six senior holiday dinners in December. The meals are an opportunity for seniors to come together, enjoy a holiday meal and hear holiday music performed by local students. There will also be brief “town meeting” updates on senior issues. The meals will be held in Barre, Bennington, Brattleboro, Burlington, Rutland and St Johnsbury.

Seating is limited and RSVPs are required. All meals start at noon except for Burlington’s dinner, which will start at 1 pm.

St. Johnsbury Senior Holiday Dinner

When: Friday, December 7 at 12:00 noon

Where: St. Johnsbury House; 1207 Main Street; St. Johnsbury

Details: RSVP by Tuesday, December 4 to Senator Sanders’ Office at 800-339-9834 (toll-free) or 802-862-0697

Burlington Senior Holiday Dinner

Vermont Business Magazine The Sanders Institute announced their inaugural conference, The Sanders Institute Gathering, late last week. Scheduled to be held in Burlington, Vermont, from Thursday, November 29th through Saturday, December 1st, 2018, the array of speakers come from both the national and international progressive community. Among the participants will be AIDS Healthcare Foundation. In late 2017, AHF launched the Healthy Housing Foundation (HHF), part of a community-based effort to address the exploding housing and homelessness crisis in Los Angeles and elsewhere in the US.

Vermont Business Magazine Representative Peter Welch (D-Vermont) issued the following statement Wednesday, November 28, 2018, concerning his vote for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House of Representatives for the 116th Congress.

Vermont Business Magazine Despite the calendar, winter seems to have arrived. "A tough job gets even tougher this time of year,” Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets Secretary Anson Tebbetts commented after this week’s wintery weather. “If getting up at 4 am every day wasn’t tough enough, Mother Nature has now added heavy, wet snow to the roof of the barn!” Winter weather conditions including snow, cold and winds present additional challenges for Vermont’s hard working farmers. The Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets wishes for all our farmers to remain safe while handling these added conditions to their daily routines. Below are a number of reminders and resources for folks involved in our farming and working lands enterprises.

Vermont Business Magazine A project in Waterbury was among four projects in New England to repair and upgrade drinking water infrastructure that were recognized for excellence and innovation by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in Boston. The Village of Waterbury was recognized for its wastewater treatment facility upgrade.

Vermont Business Magazine Vermont Secretary of State Jim Condos will hold the 2018 General Election Audit at 10:00AM on Thursday, November 29th at the Pavilion Auditorium, located at 109 State Street in Montpelier. Members of the public and the press are invited and encouraged to attend. “Ensuring the integrity and accuracy of our Vermont elections is critical to our democratic process, and to voter confidence in that process,” said Secretary Condos. “That’s why we use paper ballots and conduct a post-election audit after every General Election. We want to ensure that there are no anomalies between official results and audited results, and want to give Vermonters peace of mind in the integrity of our elections.”

Vermont Business Magazine SIX Marketing, a local boutique marketing firm based in Rutland, has announced the “Do Good Grant." This grant promises free digital marketing for one full year beginning January 1, 2019. SIX is calling for all nonprofits to apply and submit the grant application by December 10, 2018.

Vermont Business Magazine The New Hampshire / Vermont region of the American Red Cross will open shelters in Hartford and Barre, Vermont beginning at 6:00 p.m. tonight for people who find themselves displaced by power outages in Vermont. The shelters will be located at Hartford High School, 37 Highland Avenue, White River Junction, and at Barre Auditorium, 16 Auditorium Hill, Barre. Residents are facing freezing temperatures while power is being restored to their homes. The Red Cross and local emergency leadership moved to open the shelters for people needing someplace to go.The FREE Red Cross Emergency App for is available to download for mobile devices,and provides a list of open shelters in the area.

In addition: The state reports that a shelter is available at the Rochester Elementary School: 222 Main Street, which opened at 3 p.m.

Vermont Business Magazine It's the Giving Season, and many Vermonters are opening their hearts and checkbooks to donate to their favorite charities. With the current attention on giving, the Vermont Department of Taxes is teaming up with Common Good Vermont to remind Vermonters of the positive impact of giving and the changes in the 2018 Vermont income tax law that could benefit them if they donate. The Scott Administration worked with the 2018 Legislature to provide a nonrefundable charitable contribution credit against Vermont taxpayers' tax liability. This credit is 5 percent of the first $20,000 in eligible charitable contributions made during the taxable year regardless of whether the taxpayer itemizes on their federal tax return.

Vermont Business Magazine ISO New England, operator of New England’s power system, expects the region to have the necessary resources this winter to meet consumer demand, which is expected to peak at 20,357 megawatts (MW) under normal weather conditions or 21,057 MW at extreme temperatures. However, as seen during last year’s two-week cold snap, power system operations could become challenging if demand is higher than projected, if the region loses a large generator, electricity imports are affected, or during periods of fuel delivery constraints. In those instances, the ISO could be required to implement emergency operating procedures to maintain reliability.

Vermont Business Magazine Hundreds of lineworkers are working around the clock, and so far, have restored power to more than 75,000 customers after a heavy wet snow storm slammed Vermont starting Monday night. In all, more than 97,000 customers have lost power during this storm and in some areas, the outage totals continue to come in with new damage. GMP estimates (as of about 5 pm Wednesday) most of the remaining customers will have power back on by Friday night, but some outages in the hardest hit areas of Vermont may last into Saturday, or in some cases Sunday. Central and Southern Vermont along the Eastern side of the Green Mountains have the most widespread damage.

Vermont Business Magazine is preparing to publish our 32nd annual Vermont 100+, a ranking of Vermont companies based on annual revenues. Last year we listed nearly 200 companies ranked by total revenues and also ranked by industry. The rankings will be published in our January 2019 issue. If you think your company might qualify, you should enter your 2018 revenue figure (or estimate CLICK HERE FOR FORM) and mail, fax or email back your survey. If you do not know and cannot estimate 2018's revenues, please enter the figure for the most recently completed fiscal year and note what year the figure is for.