Current News

Vermont Business Magazine This weekly report is a list of planned construction activities that will affect traffic on state highways and interstates throughout Vermont for the week of August 19, 2024. Please remember to drive safely in all work zones. Lives depend on it.    

Champlain Valley Down Syndrome Group The 14th Annual Champlain Valley Buddy Walk will take place at Burlington's Battery Park on Sunday, September 29, 2024, with on-site registration opening at noon and the walk commencing at 1 PM. More than 150 people are expected to attend the event, which is one of 250 Walks across the country this fall to raise awareness and funds for programs that benefit people with Down syndrome and their families. The Buddy Walk Program was established in 1995 by the National Down Syndrome Society (NDSS) to promote acceptance and inclusion for people with Down syndrome. It is still the premier walk program for our community in the United States. This year's walk will begin and end in Battery Park, and will trace an approximately 1-mile loop through adjacent Waterfront Park.

Vermont Business Magazine Twenty-five attorneys from the northern New England law firm Downs Rachlin Martin PLLC (DRM) have been recognized in the 2025 editions of The Best Lawyers in America. Three of the firm’s lawyers were recognized as “Lawyer of the Year” honorees, and five were named to the Best Lawyers Ones to Watch in America 2025 list. Lawyers are neither required nor allowed to pay a fee to be listed; therefore, recognition by Best Lawyers® is considered a singular honor.

Vermont Business Magazine Smokey House Center is excited to announce they will host the inaugural Northeast Forest Farming Conference in partnership with the Northeast Forest Farmers Coalition from September 6th through the 8th. The conference is made possible by support from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, through the Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education program under subaward number LNE21-423. The conference will offer a comprehensive exploration of forest farming featuring workshops including a Medicine Walk with Stockbridge-Munsee herbalist, Misty Cook, a field session on the propagation of woodland botanicals with Margaret Bloomquist, an applied personhood, contextual sanctity and stewardship poultice workshop with Two-Spirit Curandere Eltón García-Sosa, wild-simulated ginseng production by Anna Plattner and Justin Wexler of Wild Hudson Valley, and a shiitake inoculation workshop with Corinna Steinrueck, among others. 

The Vermont State Police and the Bennington Police Department are investigating a missing-persons case involving Matthew Housekeeper, 59, of Bennington, Vermont. Mr. Housekeeper has not been seen or heard from since Wednesday morning, Aug. 14, 2024. The Bennington Police Department initiated an investigation Thursday, Aug. 15, after he failed to show up at work and was reported missing. At about 11:30 a.m. Friday, Aug. 16, Mr. Housekeeper’s vehicle, a white 2023 Subaru Crosstrek, was located abandoned in the vicinity of 2445 Tunnel. St. in Whitingham, near the Sherman Reservoir, in VSP’s coverage area. Troopers responded to process the scene and initiate a search. Mr. Housekeeper was not located before the search ended at nightfall. Crews plan to resume search efforts Saturday morning.

Vermont Business Magazine U.S. Senator Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Chair of the Senate Agriculture Subcommittee on Rural Development and Energy, today celebrated major investments by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Development (RD) in Vermont communities, totaling nearly $1.3 million. The announcements include funding to advance economic development across Vermont through the USDA’s Rural Business Development Grants Program. Funding will support projects across the state, including a grant of $200,000 to the Town of St. Johnsbury to establish a food cooperative, $200,000 for the Center for an Agricultural Economy, and $90,000 for Catamount Film and Arts Company. 

by Timothy McQuiston, Vermont Business Magazine Soap and skin care products manufacturer Twincraft Skincare will expand into Williston this fall. CEO Peter Asch told VermontBiz that the rapidly growing company has outgrown its two Essex Junction locations and is taking advantage of the recently available industrial space previously occupied by Keurig Dr Pepper. Keurig roasted and distributed Green Mountain Coffee from the 224,000-square-foot plant off Marshall Avenue. Twincraft will take possession of the plant in September with a lease-purchase option with owners the Miller family. Production should begin in Williston in about a year. The plant will require extensive retrofitting to handle the production of Twincraft’s skin care division. Twincraft already occupies 25,000 square feet of warehouse space in a separate building on the same parcel. Twincraft eventually will buy both buildings and the 37 ½ acres that goes with them. 

Vermont Business Magazine Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) headlined a groundbreaking event today marking the beginning of construction of 38 permanently affordable apartments, a new Veterans’ Center, and space for Burlington’s Community Justice Center. The Howard Plant VFW Post 782 sold the building to the Champlain Housing Trust this past year. Post Apartments, when complete, will include 38 apartments will be nine set aside for people experiencing homelessness – five of which will be reserved for Veterans. Champlain Housing Trust’s resident services team will support tenants and connect them to other resources in the community. Expected occupancy for the South Winooski Avenue building is the fall of 2025.

Vermont Business Magazine Jenna’s Promise has announced the Fourth Annual Open House and Benefit Concert on August 24th, 2024. This is the organization’s most important event of the year, and will be hosted at Jenna’s House, 117 St Johns Street in Johnson, which is the community center of the nonprofit. Community members from across the region are invited to enjoy food, entertainment, and speeches from state and local leaders. This year, the Jenna’s Promise team is thrilled to introduce a benefit concert by the band THEM, a 70s and 80s rock cover band. They have played for many charitable causes. The concert is in honor of Rhonda Miller, who is courageously battling a major health crisis. 

by Timothy McQuiston, Vermont Business Magazine Today, the Vermont Department of Labor released data on the Vermont economy for the time period covering July 2024. According to household data, the seasonally adjusted statewide unemployment rate for July was 2.1 percent. This reflects no change from the prior month’s revised estimate. The civilian labor force participation rate was 65.7 percent in July, no change from the prior month’s revised estimate. The comparable United States rate in July was 4.3 percent, an increase of two-tenths of one percentage point from the revised June estimate. The seasonally adjusted Vermont data for July show the Vermont civilian labor force increased by 303 from the prior month’s revised estimate. Vermont has the second lowest jobless rate in the nation. South Dakota is lowest at 2.0 percent and Nevada is highest at 5.4 percent.

Vermont Business Magazine The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Vermont in Burlington stated that Stephen Loewe, 42, of Bellows Falls, Vermont, was charged by complaint with robbing the Claremont Savings Bank in Springfield, Vermont, on August 13, 2024. Mr. Loewe had his initial appearance in federal court yesterday afternoon and is currently detained in federal custody. A hearing will be held next Thursday to determine whether he will remain detained pending trial. According to court records, Mr. Loewe committed a burglary of a Springfield, Vermont store in the early hours of August 13, 2024. Later that morning, he entered an M&T Bank branch in Springfield and demanded cash. Later that afternoon, he entered the Claremont Savings Bank in Springfield and demanded $500, stating in a note that it was a robbery. Mr. Loewe then stole a car from a gas station in Springfield. 

Vermont Business Magazine School is starting back up for Vermont students and the Agency of Education (AOE) is encouraging all families with school-aged children to “Fill the Form.” By returning the Household Income Form, or School Meals Application to their child's school, families can help secure important funding that benefits Vermont students and schools. The data collected by school districts and reported to the Agency is used to draw down the maximum federal funding for the state’s Universal Meals program. This not only reduces the program’s cost to taxpayers, but also helps to secure and equitably distribute tens of millions of dollars in other federal funding to Vermont schools for a broad range of education programs.