Current News

The Vermont Agency of Transportation this morning closed Route 108 through Smugglers Notch for the season. VTrans each fall closes this narrow roadway through a high-altitude natural area, and then reopens it in the spring when weather conditions permit. The current cold snap has brought snow and ice to the Notch region, making the roadway impassible. The long-term forecast indicates no break in the cold, snowy weather, so VTrans closed the roadway for the season. All commuters should make alternate travel plans until spring.
Source: VTrans. 10.30.2010

Rock of Ages Corporation (NASDAQ: ROAC) announced today that net income for the third quarter of 2010 was $2,200,000, or $0.30 per share, which included costs and expenses associated with the exploration of strategic options and the shareholder lawsuit totaling $358,000, or $0.05 per share. For the third quarter of 2009, net income was $1,534,000, or $0.21 per share. Revenue for this year's third quarter increased 22% to $15,756,000 compared to $12,881,000 for the third quarter of 2009.
Rock of Ages has filed documents to merge into Swenson Granite of New Hampshire. The date for a shareholders meeting to approval the merger has not been set. A preliminary proxy statement is available HERE. A story about the proposed merger to its former owner can be found HERE. Most of the voting shares are closely held by Swenson representatives, including family members.

More than 250 women from throughout Vermont gathered at Sheraton in South Burlington on Thursday for the 2010 Key4Women Forum. All proceeds from the 2010 Key4Women Forum were donated to the Vermont Women’s Fund.
‘The Vermont Women’s Fund is thrilled to once again be the beneficiary of the 9th annual Key4Women Forum. The funds we have received through this event allow us to invest in programs throughout the state that promote leadership, equality, economic independence and opportunities for personal and professional growth for Vermont’s women and girls’, said Catherine Kalkstein, Vermont Women’s Fund executive director. ‘We’re so grateful to Key and to the women who support us by attending this inspiring event!’

The Home Builders and Remodelers Association of Northern VT presented 2010 Better Homes Award Winners at a gala event October 19. More than 450 construction professionals attended the 8th annual event at the Sheraton Burlington.

Below is a list of all the winners (www.vtbuilders.com):
Better Homes Awards

The new cyberinfrastructure will provide capacity that has not previously existed for sharing large data sets among the North East Cyberinfrastucture Consortium states: Vermont, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Delaware.
Increasingly, advances in science rely on gigantic collections of data. And the analysis and sharing of these datasets rely on gigantic electronic pipelines--advanced fiber optic networks with far greater bandwidth than conventional internet services can provide -- connecting many researchers and far-flung institutions.
Which is why the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health have awarded more than $17 million to the North East Cyberinfrastucture Consortium (NECC), a coalition of universities and research institutions across five states, to build a high-speed fiber optic network.

Vermont students are not just attending the University of Vermont in near record numbers, they're staying and graduating at historically high rates, the university announced today.
Diversity enrollment also reached an historic milestone this fall, officials announced.
First-year retention -- the percentage of students who return to college after their freshman year, a widely accepted indicator of student engagement and success -- is 91 percent for in-state sophomores this fall at UVM, tying last year's all time high. In 2000 first-year retention of Vermont students was 83.8 percent.
A total of 644 Vermont students enrolled at UVM in the fall of 2009, the second highest incoming class in the last 15 years. Total Vermont enrollment is 3,277, one of the highest totals since the mid 1990's.

General Dynamics Armament and Technical Products was recently awarded an $11.5 million contract by the U.S. Navy for the production of six Aegis MK82 Illuminators, which include the MK82 guided missile director and the MK200 controller systems. Production will begin in early 2011. The contract has a total potential value of $29.5 million, and deliveries will be completed by July 2013, if all options are exercised. General Dynamics Armament and Technical Products is a business unit of General Dynamics (NYSE: GD).
Awarded by Naval Sea Systems Command in September, the contract will create four new full-time jobs at General Dynamics’ Burlington, Vt., facility, which has approximately 430 employees. Program management, assembly and testing will be performed at the General Dynamics facility in Burlington, Vt.

The Vermont Economic Development Authority (VEDA) experienced an all-time high in loan volume in Fiscal Year 2010, closing 322 separate financings, and breaking the previous year’s record of 315 loans closed. The Authority’s financing investments for the year in the manufacturing, agriculture, small business and service sectors of Vermont’s economy totaled nearly $80 million in FY2010, as compared with $94.4 million the prior year. The average hourly wage of the jobs created by companies receiving VEDA commercial financing assistance, including benefits, was projected to be $24.15.
VEDA’s year-end figures will be presented today at the Authority’s 36th Annual Meeting in Burlington.

A Seattle-based law firm says that two top executives of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc (Nasdaq: GMCR) exercised nearly $8 million in stock options prior to an SEC inquiry. GMCR filed amended forms with the Securities & Exchange Commission today that state that the two transactions made by one of the executives in September were, in fact, part of a pre-arranged trading plan executed in August.
The law firm, Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP, is investigating allegations that the Waterbury coffee company made a series of materially false and misleading statements related to the company’s business and operations in violation of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. There also have been two separate lawsuits filed in Burlington.

AllEarth Renewables, a Vermont manufacturer of grid-connected wind turbines and solar tracking systems, has received a contract to install 382 AllSun Trackers at a solar farm in South Burlington, Vermont. Final permits have been issued on the project, and construction is scheduled to begin in early November. The installation will be the largest solar array to date in the State of Vermont and is anticipated to be operational on a 32-acre site off of DuBois Drive in South Burlington, Vermont by early 2011.
The 382 AllSun Trackers will produce enough electricity to power more than 400 Vermont homes, according to AllEarth.
The AllSun Tracker solar electric system was designed by AllEarth Renewables CEO David Blittersdorf and his engineering team based in Williston, Vermont, and will be manufactured in Vermont.

Start Positive Loss Mitigation, LLC, a “foreclosure rescue” company based in Columbia, Maryland, has entered into a settlement with the Vermont Attorney General’s Office that will result in consumer refunds and payments to the State totaling $26,000.
“The last thing we will tolerate in the midst of a foreclosure crisis,” said Attorney General William H. Sorrell, “is a business that makes false promises about how it will help consumers at risk of losing their home.”

A group of Vermont colleges, universities, and high schools has signed an agreement with a Chinese group to promote the schools to Chinese students seeking to study abroad, as well as opportunities for Vermonters to study there.
Last week, Education Vermont USA, Shanghai Overseas Affairs Service Center, and North American High-Tech Center, signed an International Memorandum of Understanding at the Equatorial Hotel in Shanghai to jointly promote Sino-US cooperation and investment.
“This agreement opens the door for the parties to begin discussing and developing new mutually beneficial projects that link education to economic development in China and Vermont,” said Ali Sarafzade, Director of International Trade at the Vermont Department of Economic, Housing and Community Development.