Current News

by Abby Carroll, Community News Service A bill to help small farmers diversify their products with a new grant program crossed over from the House to the Senate, but not without a significant cut in the money behind it. The House Committee on Agriculture, Food Resiliency, and Forestry originally sought for a $500,000 appropriation for the program, which would be created through H.205. The committee wanted $250,000 of that to be in regular, general funding — or base funds — and the other half as a one-time appropriation. But before the bill went to the Senate, the House Committee on Appropriations changed the funding to a one-time appropriation of $350,000.

Vermont Business Magazine Scott Administration officials will be visiting Caledonia County on Monday to continue their county tour to hear from community leaders about their unique infrastructure needs and to discuss the many funding opportunities available to them via federal funding from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) of 2021. Officials will offer guidance on how communities can apply for assistance with tangible economic development, housing, water and sewer, climate change mitigation measures, and broadband projects.

Vermont Business Magazine Registration is open and the keynote speaker is set for the 33rd Annual Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility (VBSR) Conference, “Here and Now,” which will be held on May 11th at Hula, the award-winning lakeside coworking and innovation campus in Burlington. VBSR business and nonprofit leaders, policymakers, students, and inspired individuals will gather for a full-day event that will include a keynote address by Christal Brown, six timely sessions, three innovation labs focused on the leading edge of social and environmental impact, and ample opportunities for networking and meeting exhibitors.

Vermont Business Magazine This weekly report from the Vermont Agency of Transportation is a list of planned construction activities that will have traffic impacts on state highways throughout Vermont for the week of April 24, 2023. Please remember to drive safely in all work zones. Lives depend on it.

Leonine Public Affairs The Senate Appropriations committee approved their version of the FY2024 budget on Friday. The stakes are high as Democrats in the House and Senate work to find a path to achieve their legislative priorities while the standoff with Republican Governor Phil Scott over the budget heats up. As the Senate Appropriations committee worked through the budget this week, the House Human Services committee passed their version of one of the top Democratic priorities - childcare. The House Human Services committee passed S.56, which would significantly increase subsidies to childcare programs and families that utilize childcare and incentivize growth in the childcare sector. The committee voted 10-1 to approve S.56, which reduces the price tag of the bill as it passed the Senate by $28 million. House Human Services reduced some of the subsidy increases and removed a parental leave provision that was included in the Senate version of the bill.

by Abby Carroll, Community News Service Whether towns and cities can charge farms for stormwater utility fees is at the center of a bubbling debate between state agriculture officials and municipal leaders around Vermont. The debate was sparked during discussions of S.115, a miscellaneous agriculture bill that began in the Senate before moving to the House. The bill originally aimed to allow municipal stormwater utility operators to create bylaws to implement stormwater control but prohibit them from assessing fees on agricultural land. VAAFM officials say municipalities legally cannot regulate land subject to a set of state standards called required agricultural practices that outline how farms manage agricultural activities to improve water quality.

Vermont Business Magazine Bill Stenger back home after release from prison; Governor lets budget adjustment bill become law despite reservations; CCS to assume operational control of Green Mountain Support Services; UnitedHealthcare agrees to extend in-network coverage to UVMHN patients for rest of 2023; Hoffer releases audit of VTrans cost and schedule performance for paving; Governor announces departure of Education Secretary Dan French; GMCB FY24 hospital budget guidance caps 2-year growth at 8.6%; EPA: Vermont gets $3.72 million investment for clean water infrastructure upgrades; State’s leak detection services helped save 30.4M gallons of water in 2022; Burlington voters reject police oversight board; Blue Cross to continue OneCare payments to primary care providers; Vermont Everyone Eats program comes to a close.

Vermont Business Magazine Destination Explorer, the latest tool developed by Stowe-based Inntopia, debuts this week as the newest software program they offer to assist Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs), Convention & Visitor Bureaus (CVBs), and lodging suppliers to more closely monitor their collective and individual performance through an interactive dashboard. This is the most recent innovation by DestiMetrics, a division of Inntopia that develops and manages forward-looking data products, reports, and services for lodging properties in resort destinations. This recent addition to their growing selection of programs to assist with long-range projections for bookings, Destination Explorer adds a layer of interactivity and intelligence to the travel industry’s most accurate, forward-looking destination performance dataset.

Vermont Business Magazine Williston's iSun, Inc (NASDAQ: ISUN), a leading solar energy and clean mobility infrastructure company with 50-years of experience accelerating the adoption of innovative electrical technologies, today announced that it has received a 2.2 MW, $7.7 million contract to provide a solar carport to one of the nation’s largest financial institutions at a single location in Ohio.

Vermont Business Magazine The Literature discipline at Bennington College has received a grant from the Winston Foundation to fund a new class and reading from 2023 Ben Belitt Distinguished Visiting Writer Jonas Hassen Khemiri. The class, Writing a Life, is offered this term. A reading is scheduled for 7–8:30 pm on Wednesday, May 17, 2023, at Tishman Lecture Hall on the Bennington College Campus. Khemiri will read from his forthcoming novel The Sisters. “The Sisters is my longest and most personal novel yet, and I'm writing it in two different languages (Swedish and English) simultaneously,” said Khemiri. “It's by far the most inefficient creative process that I have been a part of. But strangely enough, also the most enjoyable.