Current News

WPTZ-TV and WOKO-FM were winners of the Best in Show awards in the 2010 VAB Commercial of the Year competition. The awards were announced during the VAB s 55th Annual Convention May 27 at the Capitol Plaza Hotel in Montpelier.
More than 195 entries were submitted by radio stations, TV stations and local advertising agencies for the VAB awards, which remains the only regional competition of its kind.
Multiple first-place award winners included television stations WCAX, WVNY and WPTZ. WJEN-FM in Rutland and WWFY-FM in Barre each won multiple first place awards in the radio competition, and Shadow Productions and Mt. Mansfield Media both took home multiple awards in the ad agency contest.
WPTZ won Best in Show among all television entries for "Contraptions," a commercial for the ECHO Lake Aquarium and Science Center in Burlington.
WOKO-FM won Best in Show for radio for "Cupholder," a commercial for Treadway Service Center.

During plant start-up activities Friday night, plant operators at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon identified a condition described as vapor and water dripping in the Advanced Off Gas excavated area. The volume was estimated to be extremely small and occurred over a period of approximately four hours. According to Yankee, this was a new leak. The leak has been stopped and there is no leak at this time. Yankee said there is no threat to public health or safety.
The vapor and water dripping was identified at approximately 7:30 pm during warm up of the AOG system. No leakage was visible after warm up and shortly after the AOG system was placed in service. The leak was located on a two-inch drain line and is approximately one-eighth of an inch in diameter.

Central Vermont Public Service said this afternoon that its crews, assisted by about 65 outside contract crews from across the northeast made steady progress today to restore power lost during Wednesday nights thunder storm. CVPS said that of this evening, the going is slow in restoring power to all customers, as each repair is only turning on a handful of customers at a time. As of 4:30 pm, about 240 CVPS customers in Rutland County and 640 customers in Windham County remain without power.
Crews will continue to work through the night. While most will be back on by late tonight, there may be some stragglers, particularly in Windham County without power into tomorrow. Crews will continue to work as quickly as they safely can to get everyone back on, so everyone can enjoy as much of their holiday weekend as possible.

President Obama has signed into law legislation authored by Senator Patrick Leahy to reauthorize satellite television licenses and to modernize satellite television services. The legislation will particularly benefit Vermonters in Bennington and Windham counties, who now may be able to receive Burlington networks through DISH, in addition DirecTV. The President signed the bill into law on Thursday.
“Vermonters are connected by the programming the state’s networks provide to television viewers, and with this new law, they can depend on continued service from satellite television providers,” said Leahy. “I urge DISH network to quickly work to exercise its new license to bring Burlington programming to Vermonters in Bennington and Windham counties. The news and information provided by Vermont stations to Vermonters should be available to consumers throughout the state.”

Governor Douglas will join with the families of fallen Vermonters, veterans, state leaders and others to celebrate the groundbreaking of Vermont’s new Global War on Terror Memorial at the Vermont Veterans’ Memorial Cemetery.
During the ceremony the Governor will also present a Gold Medal of Remembrance to the child of a Vermonter who made the ultimate sacrifice in service to our nation fighting in Global War on Terror. The Gold Medal of Remembrance is issued by the White House Commission on Remembrance.
WHAT: Memorial Day Groundbreaking Ceremony for Vermont’s Fallen Heroes Global War on Terror Memorial

WHEN: Sunday, May 30, 2010 – 3:00 p.m.

WHERE: Vermont Veterans’ Memorial Cemetery, 487 Furnace Road, Randolph Center

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN) has released its “First State-Specific Healthcare-Associated Infections Summary Data Report”, which gives an overview of where the country stands in efforts to prevent central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSI). The report is based on both national and state-specific CLABSI data collected by NHSN.
The NHSN report looked at CLABSI data from January – June 2009. During that time, Vermont hospitals reported CLABSI rates that were among the lowest of the seventeen states that were included in the report, and that were significantly lower than the report’s standardized infection ratio baseline of 1.0. Vermont’s ratio for the period reported was 0.27.

Vermont Governor Jim Douglas yesterday (May 27, 2010) vetoed H485, An Act Relating to the Use Value Appraisal Program. The governor said in his veto message that H485 greatly undermines the original intent of the Current Use program, is complicated, highly nuanced, difficult to understand, administratively complex and needlessly and unfairly increases three taxes.
Governor Douglas has supported the Current Use program since he voted for the program s inception as a member of the House in the 1970 s. I continue to support the Current Use program, and believe that it has provided great benefits to our state. It is unfortunate that the General Assembly chose to raise taxes unnecessarily and punitively on the stewards of Vermont's working landscape in an effort to address the perceived misuse of the program. A more calibrated approach is required to achieve the desired objectives, he concluded.

Governor Jim Douglas announced yesterday that he would allow S88, An Act Relating to Health Care Financing and Universal Access to Health Care in Vermont, to become law without his signature.
“Vermont is recognized as a national leader in health reform, we are the healthiest state in the nation and we are in the midst of implementing significant changes from the federal health care reform bill,” said Governor Douglas. “To spend time and money studying a new model that cannot be implemented until at least 2017 is counterproductive. Further, the drug sample reporting provision adds burdensome new regulations that are unnecessary and could make it difficult for low-income Vermonters to receive needed medications. These sections do not represent meaningful reform; rather they detract from the serious work ahead.”

By Art Edelstein. Vermont Business Magazine. May, 28, 2010 _ A multi-part health care bill (Senate 88) became law yesterday when Governor Douglas declined to either sign it or veto it, thus letting it become law without his signature. The health care bill, S88, passed both houses of the Vermont Legislature on May 11, the last day of the 2010 session.
The legislation would support aspects of the state's ongoing attempt to keep health care costs in check and lead to universal access for all Vermonters. However, two provisions of the bill irked the governor enough to cause him to threaten a veto, instead he chose to let it become law. Once a bill reaches his desk, the governor has five days to sign it into law or veto it. If he does neither, the bill becomes law without his signature at the end of the five days.

During the morning and evening commutes on Thursday, May 27, Amtrak Police, Transportation Security Administration (TSA) personnel and law enforcement officers from federal, state, local, rail and transit police agencies are being deployed at passenger rail and transit stations throughout the Northeast as part of an exercise of counterterrorism and incident response capabilities.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said today that the United States must learn a profound lesson from the BP oil catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico and make certain we protect our oceans from future disasters and transform our energy system away from fossil fuels.
Sanders introduced legislation that would ban offshore drilling along America’s ocean coastlines and increase fuel efficiency in American cars.
The measure would prohibit drilling in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans and along Florida’s gulf coastline. A moratorium on drilling in those areas that Congress approved every year since 1982 lapsed in 2008.
Sanders’ bill also would set a fuel economy standard of 55 miles per gallon, up from an average of 35 mpg that American car makers must achieve by 2030 under current law.

Senate leaders have appointed U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) as one of the 12 Senate conferees who will negotiate the final form of the landmark financial reform legislation that now has passed the Senate and the House in different forms. The conferees will meet in June.