Current News

Six Vermont organizations received a total of nearly $400,000 as US Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack selected recipients in 50 states and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico for grants to make critical repairs and improve housing conditions for low- and very-low-income rural residents.
The support Vilsack announced is provided through USDA Rural Development's Housing Preservation Grants (HPG) program. Funds are provided to intermediaries such as town or county governments, public agencies, federally recognized Indian Tribes, and non-profit and faith-based and community organizations. These organizations then distribute the grants to homeowners and owners of multi-family rental properties or cooperative dwellings who rent to low- and very-low-income residents.

The Vermont Agency of Natural Resources Department of Environmental Conservation (the Agency) has agreed to pay $85,000 in civil penalties and $30,000 to fund a Supplemental Environmental Project (SEP) under a Consent Order entered into with the Vermont Attorney General’s Office to settle claims that the Agency’s Department of Environmental Conservation RA LaRosa Environmental Laboratory violated Vermont’s environmental laws and regulations concerning the handling, storage and disposal of hazardous waste.
‘No different than any other laboratory in the state, the Agency is accountable for its failure to follow and comply with Vermont’s environmental laws,’ said Attorney General William H. Sorrell. ‘However, to its credit, as soon as the Agency suspected that violations had occurred, it contacted my Office and cooperated fully with our investigation.’

The Vermont Agency of Transportation (VTrans) today opened a storm-damaged stretch of Route 73 between Rochester and Brandon. Opening the road restores the entire length of Route 73, including a 14-mile segment known as Brandon Gap Road, to full east-west travel.
Route 73 was severely damaged on August 28 by Tropical Storm Irene. Damage included multiple roadway washouts along Brandon Gap Road, and the destruction of a 75-foot bridge at the roadway’s intersection with Route 100 in Rochester. Crews last month erected a two-lane temporary bridge at the Route 100 intersection, but Route 73 remained closed to through traffic so that work crews could complete roadway repairs along Brandon Gap Road and reestablish two lanes of travel.

A computer mapping program that lets you calculate your carbon footprint and that was developed by a company in Shelburne, Vermont, was recently recognized in a national challenge by the US Environmental Protection Agency.
Hootroot, developed by Brighter Planet, was given the overall runner-up award in EPA’s Apps for the Environment challenge, which encourages the development of innovative environmental applications..
The mapping program provides directions and carbon footprints for driving, transit, flight, and human-powered transportation options on any route.
According to Brighter Planet’s website, Hootroot ‘helps you navigate efficiently from point A to point B’ and is powered by web services from Brighter Planet, Google Maps, and HopStop. Data for the footprint calculations comes from the EPA's US Greenhouse Gas Inventory and eGRID database, as well as from other sources. As a web app, it requires no installation.

The Going to Bat for Vermont Farmers Roundtable is just days away, on November 12, and nearly 200 more General Admission tickets to the event have been released.
Yankees General Manager Brian Cashman, Cubs President of baseball operations Theo Epstein, and Pirates General Manager Neal Huntington ‘ whose family operates a dairy farm in Vermont ‘ will be at the event, to discuss their teams, the upcoming business of the offseason, and the current issues within Major League Baseball. Galen Carr, a Red Sox Scout who lives in Vermont, will represent the team on the panel. There will be a special presentation to the community on behalf of the Red Sox at the beginning of the Roundtable.

The Vermont Agency of Transportation (VTrans) today closed its Dummerston Region Incident Command Center, the last of three temporary headquarters established following Tropical Storm Irene to coordinate emergency road and bridge repairs.
The Dummerston command center, which covered 56 towns in the state’s southeast region, was critical to restoring mobility along Vermont’s storm-damaged state highway network. Leadership for all remaining Irene-related roadwork has been transitioned to VTrans’ main office in Montpelier.
‘It is impossible to put into words how much the Dummerston team has done for Vermont,’ said VTrans Secretary Brian Searles. ‘The vast majority of the state highway system has been repaired and is now ready for winter in large part due to the dedication and sacrifice of the many public and private employees who were stationed in Dummerston.’

The Green Mountain Club has accepted management responsibility for an additional 22 miles of the Appalachian Trail in Windsor County, Vermont.
The club, which founded and maintains Vermont’s Long Trail, currently manages the Appalachian Trail (AT) where it coincides with the Long Trail as well as from Killington to Route 12 in Woodstock. With this transfer, the club will also lead management efforts from Route 12 to the Connecticut River (see attached map). This stretch of trail, running through Woodstock, Pomfret, Hartford and Norwich, is highlighted by rolling hills and open areas affording hikers spectacular views.

Spot, the revolutionary new vision screening tool from PediaVision, is quickly changing the efficiency of vision screenings at schools across America due to the device's speed, accuracy, ease of use and data tracking.
The new Spot vision screener is manufactured for PediaVision by Mack Medical in Arlington, Vermont, which selected Fisher Elementary, also in Arlington, as one of the schools to conduct a pilot screening.
"It was so amazing!" said Amy Goodfellow, the school nurse at Fisher Elementary, who has done many screenings over the years. "It was a wonderful experience. It would normally take me at least 10 minutes per student for a vision screening, but with the Spot vision screener, it literally took me only 10 seconds per student."

Vermont’s congressional delegation ‘ Sens. Patrick Leahy and Bernie Sanders and Rep. Peter Welch ‘ today announced a disaster declaration that will bring federal assistance to counties affected by this spring’s flooding that were until now ineligible for such assistance.
The declaration ‘ issued today by President Obama ‘ will make public assistance available for damages sustained as a result of the storm on May 20th in Franklin, Washington and Windham counties. Previously, the disaster declaration only covered damages sustained on May 26th and 27th.
‘This spring’s flooding combined with the unprecedented damage caused by Tropical Storm Irene have seriously strained the state’s resources,’ Vermont’s delegation said in a statement. ‘As we continue fighting to ensure Vermont gets every dollar it needs to recover from these storms, this is welcome news and a step in the right direction.’

Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin gave the following address regarding the state of Vermont’s relationship with the University of Vermont. The public policy initiative, which would include the state college system, is to better focus the limited financial resources the state has into ‘maximum return on investment,’ as the governor put it, with particular focus on advancing science, engineering, technology and mathematics education.
To this end, he announced a working group comprised of prominent Vermonters with ties to UVM and led by Nick Donofrio, a former top executive at IBM in Vermont. They are charged with identifying key issues between the state and the university and making recommendations that will be presented to the governor and the new UVM president next July. UVM Interim President John Bramley is also a member of the group.
Shumlin made his remarks Tuesday afternoon at the Hoehl Gallery at the UVM College of Medicine.

By Don Vickers Vermont Student Assistance Corporation (VSAC) spent many years providing education loans to Vermont students and parents through the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP). We stopped making federal loans in July 2010 when the government switched to a system of ‘direct lending’ to families through the colleges students attend.
One of the questions we received the most during our final years in FFELP was why federal loan interest rates had risen so high. Even though we no longer issue new federal loans, we still get that question. Many Vermonters assumed that direct lending would result in lower rates, but that was never part of the plan. Nor are there any rate relief proposals on the horizon.

Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin today announced a plan to assist communities recovering from Tropical Storm Irene. Dubbed the Community Recovery Partnership, this initiative will target affected towns and regions with facilitated community conversations and cross-agency State support, as well as collaboration in long-term planning and implementation of recovery efforts.
‘We know that all recovery is local and the best role for the State is to support the towns. The first step is to talk with communities about both their current needs and their future plans, in order to better gauge the additional assistance they will need going forward,’ said the Governor. ‘We need to harness the incredible community energy of the past two months and direct it toward rebuilding Vermont into a stronger, smarter and safer state.’