Current News

Vermont Business Magazine At its meeting on December 6, Vermont Medicaid’s Drug Utilization Review Board (DURB) voted to lift some of the restrictions that currently prevent most Vermont Medicaid patients with hepatitis C from accessing life-saving cures. If the DURB’s recommendation is accepted by Department of Vermont Health Access Commissioner Steven Costantino, many more Vermonters on Medicaid who have the life-threatening disease will gain access to treatment. According to the CDC, hepatitis C kills more Americans than any other infectious disease and Baby Boomers are most at risk.

Vermont Legal Aid’s Office of the Health Care Advocate and a coalition of organizations sent a letter to the DURB in late October asking the Board to review and remove all restrictions on hepatitis C medications that deny patients access to medically necessary care and cause unnecessary harm to Vermonters. 

Vermont Business Magazine Vermont Information Technology Leaders, Inc (VITL) and PatientPing, Inc. announce the immediate availability of home health agency patient encounter notifications to the PatientPing care community. Since April, VITL has been providing PatientPing with patient encounter (admission, discharge, and transfer) messages from all of Vermont’s hospitals using existing connections to the Vermont Health Information Exchange (VHIE). PatientPing has used these messages to deliver an average of 8,000 notifications a month directly to providers around the state who are part of the PatientPing community.

Vermont Business Magazine Joseph Perras, MD, has been named Chief Executive Officer of Mt Ascutney Hospital and Health Center (MAHHC). The appointment follows months of collaborative work between the MAHHC Board of Trustees and senior leadership of Dartmouth-Hitchcock Health (D-HH) to determine the right leadership for the Hospital. Perras’ appointment was approved by the Boards of both MAHHC and D-HH today. He will assume the CEO position effective January 11, 2017.

Joseph Perras, MD, has been named Chief Executive Officer of Mt Ascutney Hospital and Health Center. MAHHC photo.

Champlain College Report Card: Are we financially illiterate? Was our lack of financial acumen a cause of the Great Recession of 2008 and does it continue to undermine our nation’s economic health? Unfortunately, the answer is yes to all of these questions, but until now, the extent of our financial ignorance had not been quantified. The 2016 National Report Card on Adult Financial Literacy, released Monday by the Center for Financial Literacy at Champlain College, shows that adults in America earned just a C grade. Vermont got a "B" and finished ninth best.

Vermont Business Magazine - by Gerianne Smart Marketing & Public Relation Manager Rutland Regional Medical Center. Rutland Regional Medical Center was established in 1896 with a handful of doctors, one nurse and a few dozen patients. Today Rutland Regional is Vermont’s largest community hospital serving over 228,000 patients a year with the expertise and exceptional caring of over 250 medical staff and 1,300 additional personnel. 

Vermont Business Magazine The University of Vermont Health Network has named John Grieco as the network’s chief technology officer, effective today, December 12. He most recently served as director of Technical Services and Operations at Partners HealthCare System in Boston. Grieco has more than 21 years of experience in information technology, primarily at Partners HealthCare. He led the technical implementation of the Epic electronic health record rollout at Partners and has successfully fostered collaboration with the 11 hospitals within the Partners HealthCare Network to achieve common goals and build strong relationships to advance their mission. 

John Grieco

by Tom Torti Last week the Blue-Ribbon Commission on Financing High Quality Affordable Child Care sent its final report to the governor and Legislature. The report provides policymakers with recommendations and financing options to make high-quality affordable child care available to all families who need it. The report makes one thing clear: investing in high-quality affordable child care and early education is a social and economic imperative for our state.

Vermont Business Magazine Congressman Peter Welch was among those who helped open Konrad Prefab’s new manufacturing facility in the Robert S Jones Industrial Center in Springfield. Konrad Prefab specializes in the design and production of modular and display units. Their initial product line are lactation suites, which will be distributed by Burlington Vermont-based Mamava. The suites will be installed in public facilities around the country to support nursing mothers.

Congressman Peter Welch helped celebrate the opening of the new Konrad plant in Springfield on Monday. Courtesy photo.

Welch said. “It’s heartening to see a new, vibrant manufacturer in a community that’s synonymous with manufacturing globally.”

Vermont Business Magazine is preparing to publish our 30th annual Vermont 100+, a ranking of Vermont companies based on 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 2017 issue. If you think your company might qualify, you should enter your 2016 revenue figure (or estimate) in the space provided and mail, fax or email back your survey. If you do not know and cannot estimate 2016's revenues, please enter the figure for the most recently completed fiscal year and note what year the figure is for.

Even if you do not wish to be considered for the Vermont 100+, you likely should be included in VBM's "Business & Manufacturers Directory," a B2B publication, which we will publish in May 2016.

Vermont Business Magazine Green Mountain Power today is filing its intention to submit a traditional regulated rate case on or before April 15, 2017 -- and seeking to freeze base rates for customers until 2018, when the new rates would go into effect. Base rates for customers are currently lower than they were in 2013, and the company has delivered three bill decreases in that time. GMP wants to extend its current rate structure in order to file the new rate case. The net result of the base rate freeze will mean that customers will see more than four years of reduced rates.

Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Community Loan Fund (VCLF) has announced the launch of SPROUT, a low-interest, deferred payment loan program for working lands entrepreneurs. The new financing program was created to meet the capital needs of Vermont farms, food producers & processors, foresters, forest products businesses and others in the start-up and early stages of operations. Earlier this year, SPROUT received start-up support from the Working Lands Enterprise Board.

SPROUT offers deferred-payment, low-interest loans of up to $60,000 at 0% with no payments for the first two years, with a 2% fixed rate thereafter. VCLF will also coordinate comprehensive business development and financial planning/management technical assistance tailored to meet borrowers’ individual needs, free-of-charge.

Vermont Business Magazine US Senators Ben Cardin (D-Md), Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif), and Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) called Monday for the creation of an independent, nonpartisan commission to comprehensively investigate alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election. The commission would fully investigate alleged Russian cyberattacks on US political entities and election infrastructure, seek to identify those responsible, and recommend a response as well as actions the US can take to defend itself in the future.  

Modeled on other independent commissions, this body would compile all available classified intelligence and open source information, conduct hearings and interviews, with subpoena power, and report its findings to Congress within 18 months from being formed. The membership of the commission would be individuals appointed by the bipartisan, bicameral Congressional leadership.