Current News

Governor Jim Douglas appointed Thomas N. Pelletier of Montpelier to be chairman of the Vermont Housing Finance Agency (VHFA) Board of Commissioners. The change took effect upon the Governor's appointment Tuesday.
"Tom's been a highly-respected member of Vermont's lending community for more than a decade and has served on our Board since May 2008," says Executive Director Sarah Carpenter. "We welcome him as VHFA's new Board chairman."
Pelletier has been President and Chief Executive Officer of Northfield Savings Bank in Northfield since 1998. He serves as a Director of Public Television of Vermont and Norwich University Applied Research Institutes, Ltd.; and is a member of the Community Bankers Council of the American Bankers Association.
Pelletier replaces Lisa Mitiguy Randall who stepped down after nine years as Board chair. She will continue to serve on the Board for the remainder of her term.

As previously announced delSECUR CORPORATION, of South Burlington, had received shareholder approval to sell its Intellectual Property Assets to QTECH SYSTEMS INC., an Ontario company. The agreement was finalized on October 24th and the patent has been officially transferred to QTECH from Pierre de Lanauze on November 17th, 2009.

Robert Hofmann, Pamela Mackenzie and Scott Milne have been elected to the board of directors of Vermont Public Television, Vermont's statewide public television network.
Hofmann, of Waterbury Center, Vt., has been Vermont’s secretary of human services since 2008. Before that, he was the state’s commissioner of finance and management, then commissioner of corrections.
Active in professional organizations, Hofmann is a past director of the Vermont Chamber of Commerce. He has served on government boards and task forces and was recently appointed to the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board. In his local community, he has participated in school, church and children’s sports activities.
Hofmann is a graduate of SUNY College of Cortland and received an MBA from Columbia University Graduate School of Business.
Mackenzie, of South Burlington, Vt., is the area vice president for Comcast in Vermont and western Massachusetts.

The Board of Trustees at Southern Vermont College appointed Professor Anita Hill as a new Board Member at its recent meeting. Hill is a faculty member at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University. She has taught law and social policy for 25 years and lectures regularly in the U.S. and abroad and serves on a wide range of Boards.
"We are honored that Professor Hill has accepted our invitation to join the Southern Vermont College Board of Trustees,” stated Board Chair, Wallace Altes. “She is a scholar of the first rank; an eloquent advocate for those who too often do not have an advocate; and a role model for all young people.”

Vermont's unemployment rate fell again in October to 6.5 percent from the September seasonally adjusted rate of 6.7 percent. The rate in both August and July was 6.8 percent. The rate during this recent downturn peaked at 7.4 percent in May. Meanwhile, seasonally adjusted job losses in Vermont from October 2008 were 10,700. The unemployment rate in October 2008 was 5.2 percent.

Five market leading US and Canadian restaurant chains -- Bruegger’s Bagels (based in Burlington), Fazoli’s Restaurants, Friendly’s Ice Cream, Smokey Bones Bar & Fire Grill and Timothy’s Coffees of the World Inc -- today announced that they have joined forces to target non-traditional concession opportunities around the country, including food courts at airports, universities and hospitals.

Vermont’s downtowns and village centers were in the spotlight last week for efforts to make them more vibrant and prosperous. The Green Mountain Awards were part of the Vermont Downtown Program’s annual Downtown Conference in Middlebury last week, which celebrated 11 years of revitalizing Vermont.
“These awards recognize the hard work and dedication to community revitalization that goes on in so many Vermont towns,” said Joss Besse, Director of the Division of Community Planning and Revitalization. “Our downtowns and village centers are so critical to our way of life, and much of the effort that sustains them is volunteer.”
One of the award winners was the venue that hosted the awards – Middlebury’s Town Hall Theatre, which had fallen into serious disrepair after it was abandoned as the municipal offices years ago, won the Best Building Renovation award.

Vermont Technical College this week was certified by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) as a “School of Priority Status”, which will allow its graduates direct-hire access to jobs and internships at airports and FAA facilities throughout the United States. Under the FAA’s Airway Facilities - Collegiate Training Initiative (AF-CTI), students at approved colleges and universities are eligible for internships during their college years in specialized aviation-related fields of study.
Vermont Tech is the only college in Vermont and one of just 40 schools nationwide to be named an FAA School of Priority Status.

The US Census Bureau has begun its second round of Census applicant testing across the State of Vermont. The Census Bureau is looking for qualified applicants to fill hundreds of temporary positions beginning in the spring of 2010; the first step in the application process is the completion of an entrance exam.
Successful applicants will conduct face-to-face interviews with Vermonters who fail to return their Census questionnaires by mail. The jobs are temporary; some are full time and others part time. Census jobs offer flexible schedules and allow close-to-home employment. Field operations pay starts at $13.50 per hour and varies by job.

Open Text(TM) Corporation ( OTEX, TSX: OTC), a global leader in Enterprise Content Management (ECM), has commemorated the successful conclusion of its annual user conference Content World by announcing the recipients of its customer and partner awards. The week-long conference, which concluded on Oct. 30 in Orlando, Fla., hosted more than a thousand customers and partners and featured 125+ sessions focused on ECM customer case studies, best practices, emerging trends and technical expertise.
"During this challenging economic environment, companies rely on ECM technology to reap maximum benefits and shape strategic growth," said John Shackleton, President and Chief Executive Officer, Open Text. "I commend our customers and partners alike for their visionary use of our ECM Suite and the innovative routes they took to attain valuable business accomplishments."
2009 GlobalStar Enterprise Award

MyWebGrocer Media connected with more than 2.7 million unique users in September, making it the single largest online grocery destination, according to comScore’s data. The rapidly growing ad network has more than doubled in size in the past year.*The Largest Online Grocery AudienceThe Nielsen Company recently reported** that, in July of 2009, more than 13 million U.S. Internet users visited a grocery site. With 2.7 unique monthly users, MyWebGrocer Media represents the web’s largest online grocery audience, roughly 21% of the online grocery population. MyWebGrocer Media is a top destination among online food enthusiasts, with more unique monthly visitors than both Yahoo! Food and Epicurious.com, as measured by comScore.Active and Engaged UsersNot only is MyWebGrocer Media’s audience big, its users are highly engaged. The average MyWebGrocer shopper spends 11.9 minutes on the network and views 28 pages of content (October 2009).

Senators Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Representative Peter Welch (D-VT.) today announced that the Village of Barton will receive $2.8 million for water system improvements funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The $2.08 million grant along with a $723,000 loan awarded to Barton was among 31 water projects announced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture using economic stimulus funds to help rebuild the nation's infrastructure and create or retain jobs.
“Recovery Act projects are helping rural communities of all sizes build a foundation for economic strength, future prosperity, and a healthy environment," Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said in making the announcement.
The stimulus program includes measures to modernize the nation’s infrastructure, foster energy independence, expand educational opportunities, improve affordable health care, and provide tax relief.