Current News

Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Community Foundation announced that it awarded more than $16.7 million in grants in Vermont and beyond in 2015, one of the highest levels of grantmaking in the Foundation’s 30-year history. The great majority of the grants were made by individuals, families, and businesses who work through the Community Foundation, while more than $1 million of the total was awarded through staff-guided grant programs. Many nonprofit organizations also have some or all of their endowment at the Foundation.

The grants addressed a broad range of issue areas including the arts, the environment, education, local food, health and human services, economic development, and more.

Vermont Business Magazine For the second consecutive year, Sterling College has been confirmed as the top college in the United States that serves food on campus that is local, sustainable, humane, and fair-trade.

This ranking comes from the Real Food Challenge, which surveyed over 200 colleges and universities throughout the United States. After analyzing all of the food used in the Sterling College kitchen from July 2014 to June 2015, the college found that 75% of its food met the real food qualification for production methods. Last year, Sterling College was at 74% real food. In comparison, the next-highest ranked institution only eats 66% real food.

Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Dairy Promotion Council and the Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food, and Markets have partnered to launch a new website and video highlighting the economic impact of the state’s dairy industry. The site, which features the findings of the 2015 Milk Matters report, also includes historic data, resources, and dairy farmer profiles. The accompanying video provides a topline summary of key facts from Milk Matters, and was designed to be shared through social media. Both projects were funded by Vermont dairy farmers, through the milk check-off program, administered by the Vermont Dairy Promotion Council.

Vermont Business Magazine Offers Low-Income Assistance Program, WARMTH support, access to energy efficiency to Vermonters on fixed incomes

As cold weather cycles back into the northeast, Vermont Gas reminds its customers about resources available to Vermonters in need. Vermont Gas offers a low-income assistance program, support for the Champlain Valley Office of Economic Opportunity’s (CVOEO) WARMTH program, and access to cost-saving energy efficiency programs.

These programs support those most in need, including low-income and fixed-income Vermonters who are in need of emergency heating assistance, ongoing support, and efficiency services to bring down heating costs.

Vermont Business Magazine State Treasurer Beth Pearce has announced that the per participant fee for the State of Vermont 457 Deferred Compensation Plan has been reduced by 30 percent. The deferred compensation plan is a supplemental retirement savings program available to members of the Vermont State Employees’ Retirement System, and those within participating municipalities and school supervisory unions.

“I am committed to implementing cost-saving measures for our customers whenever possible,” said Pearce. “It was determined that administrative fees could be reduced based upon future projections of fee collections and expenses.”

Vermont Business Magazine After a baffling Super Bowl advertisement promoting a drug to help Americans take more opiates, Gov. Peter Shumlin is calling on the two drug companies that paid for it to pull the ad off the air and instead use the money to fund opiate and heroin prevention and treatment programs. In a letter to the drug makers, the Governor called the ad poorly timed and a shameful attempt to exploit America’s addiction crisis to boost corporate profits.

Vermont Business Magazine At its February meeting, the UVM Board of Trustees approved two much-anticipated undergraduate degree programs – a bachelor of science in biomedical engineering and a bachelor of science in data science – and heard an encouraging report on UVM’s comprehensive campaign.

The new degree programs support UVM’s efforts to expand STEM education, with a goal of doubling enrollments in STEM-related programs by 2020. The programs in the College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences will be housed in the new $104 million STEM complex of laboratories, classrooms and research facilities scheduled for completion in May of 2019.

Vermont Business Magazine The Keurig® KOLD™ Drinkmaker, by Keurig Green Mountain, Inc., (Keurig) (NASDAQ: GMCR), has been named a 2016 Award Finalist by the internationally renowned Edison Awards™. The distinguished awards, inspired by Thomas Edison's persistence and inventiveness, recognize innovation, creativity and ingenuity in the global economy.

This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160211005227/en/

Vermont Business Magazine President Obama announced plans to request full funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund in his FY17 budget request. This includes more than $1 million for the Silvio O Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge (Connecticut/Massachusetts/New Hampshire/Vermont). According to theannouncement from the Department of Interior, in 2017, the President's budget calls for $900 million in conservation and recreation projects, through a combination of discretionary ($475 million) and mandatory ($425 million) funding, and pursues permanent authorization in annual mandatory funding beginning in FY18.  

National Wildlife Refuge Association President David Houghton had this to say:

Vermont Business Magazine. The facts on wasted food are staggering—Americans generated 37 million tons of food waste in 2013 alone, with only five percent diverted from landfills and incinerators for composting, according to US Environmental Protection Agency. EPA’s cost estimate of this waste is about $165 billion a year. 

Reducing, donating, and diverting wasted food offers multiple benefits for business, including savings from reduced commodities purchased and potential disposal cost reductions. Businesses receive recognition for their environmental action, potential access to tax credits through donation of wholesome food, along with additional community and social benefits through donation.

Vermont Business Magazine. Steven Judge, a well-known Micro Dairy farmer with over 50 years of experience in the dairy industry and founder of Bob-White Systems, has always been an advocate for environmentally responsible farming, community-based farms and farmers. He has turned that advocacy into a new campaign to support small farms in Vermont and ensure that new legislation, ACT 64, doesn’t put small farms out of business.