Current News

Crews converge on Windham and Windsor counties
Tree damage in Wilmington area is worst many workers have ever seen
RUTLAND (December 15, 2008)-- After more than 90 hours of restoration work since the first customer went out last Friday, line and tree crews have restored service to 30,100 of the 35,000 CVPS customers who lost power after last week's ice storm. CVPS has acquired 10 line crews from Hydro One in Canada. They will arrive on CVPS property late tonight to assist in the restoration effort tomorrow.
Most customers in Windsor County will be back on by late Tuesday evening, but single customer outages and areas with extreme damage - especially the Wilmington, Readsboro, Wardsboro, Dover, Guilford area -- will carry later into the week.

Governor Douglas to announce $1.6 million in Grant Awards

December 15, 2008

Moment Analytics Offers Source Code and 'Outsourcing to Vermont'

The Burlington law firm Paul Frank + Collins is pleased to announce the addition of Kristina M. Roomet to the firm. Roomet is a member of the Property & Development and Environmental Law teams at PF+C. Her practice focuses on environmental, land use, energy, and health & safety law.

VERMONT COMMUNITY FOUNDATION HIRES STUART COMSTOCK-GAY AS PRESIDENT & CEO
MIDDLEBURY, VT - The board of the Vermont Community Foundation announced that Stuart Comstock-Gay has been named the next President & CEO. Comstock-Gay comes to the Foundation with more than 20 years of experience in building the capacity, reach, and impact of institutions dedicated to bringing people together in the pursuit of community-minded goals.

Governor Announces Bold Multi-state Effort to Prepare Students across New England for Success in the 21st Century

Groundbreaking four-state collaboration will work to reinvent the high school experience
MONTPELIER (December 15, 2008) - Governor Douglas today announced the formation of the New England Secondary School Consortium, a groundbreaking regional partnership encompassing four states: Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont.

The Consortium is funded by the Nellie Mae Education Foundation, the largest philanthropy in New England focused exclusively on education. The Nellie Mae Education Foundation has committed $1 million to support the Consortium, which includes a $500,000 partnership grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the world's largest philanthropic foundation.

Extreme ice and tree damage knocks out power to 24,000 CVPS customers
RUTLAND -A storm that has caused hundreds of thousands of people to lose power across the Northeast has knocked out power to 24,000 CVPS customers Friday morning. The effort will take days, CVPS said, as the storm is comparable to the ice storm of January 2007, and the infamous ice storm of '98.
CVPS line crews are working with outside contract crews to assess the damage and start making repairs this morning, however, road conditions and continuing sleet and ice accumulation are slowing the restoration effort. Hundreds of downed trees, tree limbs and downed lines have been reported across central and southern Vermont. Windsor and Windham counties were hit the hardest, with significant outages in Orange, Rutland and Bennington counties as well.

KNOXVILLE, Tenn., Dec. 11 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- An empty 334,000-square-foot building and an eager workforce explain only in part why Vermont-based Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc. (Nasdaq: GMCR) chose the Knoxville-Oak Ridge Innovation Valley of Tennessee for a major expansion site that eventually will employ 300 workers.
"The central location makes us more efficient, reduces our transportation and distribution costs and shortens delivery lead times of our products," according to Jon Wettstein, Green Mountain's vice president for supply chain operations.
But he says a well-coordinated economic development community also helped seal the deal.

State revenue sources struggle
(December 12, 2008) Secretary of Administration Neale F. Lunderville today released General Fund revenue results for the month of November, the fifth month of Fiscal Year 2009. General Fund revenues were essentially on target for the month as compared to the recently revised consensus revenue target. The General Fund revenues of $70.59 million for the month of November 2008 were +$0.25 million or +0.35% above the $70.34 million consensus revenue forecast for the month. Cumulatively, General Fund revenues year-to-date were $455.85 million or +0.25 million (+0.05%) above the consensus revenue forecast for Fiscal Year 2009.

Vermont Office of Economic Opportunity and Vermont Tech Launch Weatherization Quality Control Training

RANDOLPH CENTER, VT - The Vermont Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO), the Technology Extension Division (TED) at Vermont Technical College and the Center for Sustainable Practices (CSP) at Vermont Tech launched the first of several distinct weatherization certificate trainings this week aimed at improving and enhancing Vermont's weatherization workforce.

Governor Douglas Makes Case for States
Testifies on need for state-federal partnerships and federal financial assistance
Montpelier, VT (December 11, 2008, Vermont Business Magazine via Governor's Office) - Today Governor Jim Douglas testified before the House Appropriations Committee in Washington, DC, on the Impact of the Recession on States and Local Communities. As the Vice Chair of the National Governors Association, Governor Douglas has been instrumental in facilitating a national dialogue on the need to deepen partnerships between the federal and state governments.

Maine Joins Vermont, Other States in NECAP Testing Partnership
MONTPELIER - Maine has joined New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont as the fourth member of the New England Common Assessment Program (NECAP), the first and only multi-state testing partnership formed in response to the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).

As the newest NECAP partner, Maine will join the other three member states in developing and administering the NECAP tests in reading, writing, and mathematics to all students in grades 3 through 8. The tests are developed in common by all partner states and are aligned with the state standards (what all students should know and be able to do at each grade level) that all NECAP states have adopted.
The results of the tests, which are required by NCLB, determine whether schools have made Adequate Yearly Progress and what actions state agencies will initiate to assist in improving student performance.