Current News

A proposed radioactive waste import/export rule would open Texas up to becoming the nation's radioactive waste dumping ground, according to an anti-nuclear group in Texas, thus allowing waste from around the country to go to Waste Control Specialists' site in Andrews County in West Texas, instead of limiting the site to the Compact states of Texas and Vermont.
"More radioactive waste would mean increased financial, health and environmental risks," said SEED Coalition Director Karen Hadden. "Analysis by nuclear expert Dr. Arjun Makhijani found that if the license was expanded and non-Compact states were allowed in, there could be nineteen times more radioactive waste than originally planned for."

Brattleboro, Vermont-based GS Precision will soon enlarge its manufacturing footprint in Guaymas, Sonora, Mexico. The company has signed an agreement with the Tucson, Arizona-based Offshore Group to expand the leased space at the Roca Fuerte Industrial Park from its current 17,000 to 36,000 square feet. The more than doubling of production space will eventually result in a proportional increase in the plant's workforce.
According to the company's President, Norm Schneeberger, "This expansion reflects the confidence we have in the leadership and workforce in our Guaymas facility, as well as the Offshore Group's Maquilas Tetakawi, S.A. de C.V. The increase in our manufacturing in Mexico capacity is part of G.S. Precision's overall growth strategy, and will enable us to increase our ability to provide our customers with a lower cost option and expanded services, while continuing to leverage the experience and expertise of our team in Vermont."

CVPS crews restored power to more than 20,000 customer outages yesterday and last night, after strong winds pounded the state Wednesday, knocking out power to more than 29,000 CVPS customers. Wind gusts above hurricane force hit several of the state, as part of a storm that affected much of the East Coast and knocked out the power to tens of thousands of Vermonters.
As of 7:30 am Thursday morning, 9,600 CVPS customers remain without power, the majority in Rutland, Addison, Chittenden and Orange and Windsor counties. CVPS crews and more than 35 outside contract crews will be working through the day today and into this evening to restore power as quickly as is safely possible.

High winds caused significant outages throughout Vermont Wednesday night, with multiple utilities reporting a total of 33,000 customers without power. At the peak of the storm, 4,500 of Green Mountain Power customers were without power. Compounding the difficulties of the power outages was a regional phone issue that affected the ability of Green Mountain Power customers to report power outages.
‘Due to disruptions in the regional phone system, our customer service representatives were unable to hear customers when they called,’ said Dorothy Schnure, GMP spokesperson. ‘We were able to return the calls to many of them, but regret the inconvenience our customers experienced as a result of the phone issue.’
Green Mountain Power linecrews were able to continue restoring power throughout the evening. As of 11 pm Wednesday, 1,800 GMP customers were still without power, with all utilities reporting 24,000 out statewide.

Strong winds that pounded VEC’s service territory left several thousand VEC members without power due to downed trees and power lines and broken utility poles. Winds knocked power out to over 12,000 VEC members at the height of the storm. As of 10:15 pm. over 9,000 VEC members remain without power and should plan for the likelihood that it will not be restored until Friday, and in some cases, it is expected to go into the weekend.
‘VEC has more than tripled our resources by bringing in mutual aid crews from New Hampshire and other Vermont utilities,’ said Jeffrey Wright, COO. ‘To ensure the safety of our crews and fully utilize our resources we are sending most of our crews home for rest time. We will begin working again at daylight and will focus on the largest outages first, beginning with the Williston, Hinesburg, Jericho and Island Pond areas.’

BURLINGTON’Vermont Housing Finance Agency (VHFA) will donate a pair of mittens stuffed with candy to Burlington’s King Street Center for every new fan that joins the Agency’s Facebook page through Wednesday, Dec. 15.
‘Our ‘mitten stuffing’ drive has been a holiday tradition at VHFA for many years,’ according to Executive Director Sarah Carpenter. ‘This year, we thought we’d up the ante by agreeing to donate a pair of mitten or gloves stuffed with holiday candy for every new fan who joins the Agency’s Facebook page.’
Facebook users can visit the VHFA page at http://on.fb.me/vhfaMittens, and become fans of the Agency by clicking the ‘Like’ button at the top of the page.

US Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) announced Wednesday that the US Army Medical Command has begun implementing a new first-in-the-nation medical pilot program for returning members of the 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, which includes most of the line-of-duty injuries among the 1,300 Vermont National Guard members who are returning from deployments in Afghanistan. The reforms, requested of the Army by Leahy, are designed to ease the recovery of wounded soldiers by returning them earlier to their homes and families.

The total value of Vermont construction contracts this year through October were down 23 percent as federal funding for highway and bridge construction waned. But both residential and commercial spending showed modest gains after two years of sluggish building in each. Residential was up 16 percent for the year-to-date and commercial was up 12 percent. New Hampshire showed a similar rebound in residential and commercial construction.
Meanwhile, total US construction spending increased by 0.7 percent in October, driven largely by growing demand for power projects and public construction, the Associated General Contractors of America noted today in an analysis of new Census Bureau data. The new data, however, indicated continued weakness in many construction categories, including private nonresidential and single family construction, association officials observed.

Governor-elect Shumlin sent the following letter to Vermont school board members today regarding the tax rate recommended by the acting Tax Commissioner, Ellen Tofferi. The letter suggests that the current tax rate will continue for 2012 and that the one-time, $19 million federal contribution could be used to bridge the expected shortfall in funding over the next two years.
The Shumlin and Tofferi letters follow:
December 1, 2010
Dear School Board Member,
Thank you for your hard work to maintain the quality of our public schools and contain costs. I am deeply grateful for your commitment to Vermont’s children. It is due, in large part, to your hard work that our students have access to one of the best education systems in the country. As we both understand well, our state’s economic success and future relies on this quality. In addition, your work to keep FY2011 spending at a level rate is critical and greatly appreciated by all Vermonters.

Employees of IBM in Vermont collected more than four tons of food ‘ 8,110 pounds ‘ for food shelves in Vermont and New York. The food drive was part of IBM’s annual Employee Charitable Contribution Campaign, an employee-run fundraising event that offers employees the opportunity to contribute to non-profit charities. This year, IBM employees pledged $971,000 to support Vermont United Ways and other charitable organizations.
The food drive was one of several campaign activities that extended the employees’ contributions. To promote the program, employees held a ‘food sculpture’ contest, in which employee teams built displays out of the donated boxes and cans of food. Subjects included a full-size park bench, model rockets, a giant-size soup bowl and the SpongeBob SquarePants cartoon character.
Food donations were distributed to the following organizations:
‘ Addison County Community Action, Middlebury, VT ‘ 540 pounds of food

At a time when 76-million Americans are sickened by food-borne illnesses each year, the Senate today voted 73 to 25 for legislation to strengthen food safety.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) responded to concerns by small farmers in Vermont, where there has been a significant increase in sustainable vegetable farms, and added a provision exempting small, low-risk, on-farm food processors from the new regulations aimed at large agribusinesses.
‘While this legislation gives the FDA new tools to protect American families from contaminated foods, we avoided placing unnecessary requirements on small farms in Vermont and elsewhere,’ said Sanders, a member of the Senate health committee. ‘We struck the right balance between the viability of small family farms that process foods and the safety of the nation’s food supply.’

Weekly unemployment claims continued their sharp rise last week continuing an upward trend over the last couple of months to reach a similar level to a year ago. For the week of November 27, 2010, there were 1,795 new regular benefit claims for Unemployment Insurance, an increase of 394 from the week before. Altogether 10,160 new and continuing claims were filed, an increase of 597 from a week ago and 1,685 fewer than a year earlier. The Department also processed 2,172 First Tier claims for benefits under Emergency Unemployment Compensation, 2008 (EUC08), 213 fewer than a week ago. In addition, there were 624 Second Tier claims for benefits processed under the EUC08 program, which is a decrease of 72 from the week before. The Unemployment Weekly Report can be found at: http://www.vtlmi.info/.