Vermont Business Magazine Charity Clark announced today that she is running for Attorney General. Clark, who previously served as an Assistant Attorney General and Chief of Staff at the Attorney General’s Office, outlined her vision for the office of Attorney General at a press conference in Winooski this morning.
Vermont Business Magazine The Federal Emergency Management Agency will be sending more than $11.6 million to the State of Vermont to reimburse the costs of providing testing during the COVID-19 pandemic. The $11,640,655 in Public Assistance grants will go to the Vermont Agency of Human Services for contracting to provide testing services for the public at large and for those who needed tests to access state facilities.
Vermont Business Magazine Community Bank System, Inc (NYSE: CBU), the parent company of Community Bank, NA, with branches across Vermont, announced today that Community Bank completed its merger with Elmira Savings Bank, a New York state chartered savings bank (NASDAQ-CM: ESBK) on May 13, 2022. Community Bank acquired Elmira in an all cash transaction representing total consideration valued at approximately $82.8 million. The merger added eight branch locations across a five-county area in the Central New York and Southern Tier markets. With completion of the merger, Community Bank System has over $16.2 billion in assets and over $13.8 billion in deposits.
Vermont Business Magazine Norwich University, in partnership with Spotlight Labs, has been awarded a three-year $371,000 Small Business Innovation Research grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to continue work on the Impact of Cockpit Electro-Magnetics on Aircrew Neurology (ICEMAN) project. This grant will fund research on Phase II of the ICEMAN project after Norwich and Spotlight completed Phase I of the study.
Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Democratic Party announced that they've hired Jim Dandeneau as the Party’s Interim Executive Director. Dandeneau is a familiar figure in Vermont political circles who is widely respected as an able and effective leader. He joined the VDP as House Campaign Director in 2017, leading the effort to recruit, train, and run more than 120 candidates for the Vermont House of Representatives. Democrats picked up 12 seats, resulting in a supermajority coalition that was able to override gubernatorial vetoes on key issues.
by Devon Green, VP of Government Relations, VAHHS Ding, dong, the 2021-2022 legislative biennium is dead! Or, on life support until we see if the governor issues any more vetoes and calls a special session. It’s been a long two years, as reflected in the number of legislators leaving, including Bill Lippert, Chair of the House Health Care Committee. I will never forget that day in March of 2019 when he asked health care providers what they needed during the pandemic and then passed supportive legislation in about 24 hours. Thank you.
Vermont Agency of Agriculture Food & Markets The Working Lands program continues to increase its historic funding for those who make their living off the land. This May, the program awarded $3.1 million in grants that will help grow agriculture and forest businesses in Vermont. New Supply Chain and Market Level Impact specific grants will help businesses leverage supply chain partnerships at a significant scale, with awards of up to $250K. Please follow the link in each category to view the individual businesses receiving 2022 program funds.
Vermont Business Magazine A spirit of deep gratitude and joy should animate each person joining the overwhelming but urgent work of tackling climate change, a leading Catholic environmentalist told nearly 480 Saint Michael’s College 2022 graduates on a rainy Sunday morning for the College’s outdoor 115th Commencement on May 15. “We must all do our part to save the earth from our own selfishness and our own foolishness,” said Dan Misleh, founder of Catholic Climate Covenant and longtime activist to address global warming.
by C.B. Hall, Vermont Business Magazine Each year, the people who study such things inform us that our state's dairy farms, so emblematic of what makes Vermont, Vermont, continue to dwindle in number. According to the state's Agency for Farms, Food and Markets, Vermont had 973 cow dairy farms in 2012. Five years later, there were 796 — 18% fewer. By the first quarter of this year, the number stood at 564, a further decline of 29%. Thirty-eight farms — one or two a week — disappeared in the seven months between May and December 2020, following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, which occasioned a major decline in demand as schools and restaurants shut down. In three months, the average price that Vermont's dairy farmers received for their product through the federal milk market system plummeted 27%, to $12.82 per hundredweight of raw milk, according to the USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service.
Vermont Business Magazine The Southwestern Vermont Chamber of Commerce, in partnership with Berkshire Bank, presented the inaugural Women In Leadership Luncheon at the Wilson House in Dorset, Vermont on Wednesday, May 11 from 12pm to 2pm. The luncheon highlighted the many women leaders in the Southwestern region of Vermont, while creating connections, partnerships and networking opportunities with those in attendance.
by Meg Hansen One signature and one vote thwarted the attempt to upend heating in Vermont's built environment. Governor Phil Scott won the game of political ping pong against the Legislature, when the latter failed to override his veto of the Clean Heat Standard (CHS) bill by one vote. The CHS was touted as the most impactful plan to meet the carbon reduction goals mandated by the Global Warming Solutions Act (GWSA). But Scott asked for the invoice upfront. Politicians who buy today with the promise of paying tomorrow (when they'll be gone) were then forced to defang the bill. The new version still lacked “details on costs and impacts” and delegated outsized policymaking authority to the three-member Public Utilities Commission. So, Scott rejected it.
Vermont State Police On May 1, 2022, Vermont State Police was notified of an emaciated abandoned Pitbull that was located at the intersection of Brown Hill Road an Eagle Ledge Road in Elmore, VT. With the assistance of the public through social media and local community resources, the owner of the dog was identified as Tara Smith (30) of Morrisville. Investigation revealed Smith had possession of the dog beginning in the fall of 2021. During ownership, Smith deprived the dog from adequate nutrition resulting in the dog to become emaciated as well as inhumanely containing the dog in unsanitary living conditions.