Keeping your community covered. We're committed to producing high-quality, fact-based news and information that gives you the facts in this community we call home. If our work has helped you stay informed, take action, or feel more connected to Windham County – please give now to help us reach our goal of raising $150,000 by December 31st.
Keeping your community covered. We're committed to producing high-quality, fact-based news and information that gives you the facts in this community we call home. If our work has helped you stay informed, take action, or feel more connected to Windham County – please give now to help us reach our goal of raising $150,000 by December 31st.
After nearly 16 months of work, it appears voters won't get a chance to weigh in on a five-town school merger proposal in Windham Southeast Supervisory Union.
Following two failed attempts to cut Vernon loose from the union's consolidation talks, the members of Windham Southeast's Act 46 Study Committee convened March 2 and decided to ask state education officials for guidance on what to do next.
The committee could have tried to forge ahead by asking voters in Brattleboro, Dummerston, Guilford, Putney, and Vernon to consider a long-discussed plan to merge the union's schools. But committee members decided not to do so, given the clear opposition in some of those towns.
“My big concern ... in holding a vote is that we would come off as ramming something down our communities' throats that's not necessarily palatable,” said Amy Wall, a Dummerston representative on the study committee.
It's safe to say Julie Moore, in her first public appearance here as state Agency of Natural Resources secretary, wasn't hoping to hear the word “Kafkaesque.” But that was just one of the terms that area residents used at a March 2 meeting to describe their frustrations with the...
Area school consolidation efforts took a hit on Town Meeting Day, as voters rejected two of Windham County's three Act 46 merger proposals. In Windham Northeast Supervisory Union, a four-town merger failed. And in Windham Central, only half of a two-tiered Act 46 plan gained approval. While voters in...
The Brattleboro Retreat's “Tyler 3” unit offers Vermont's only inpatient mental-health beds for adolescents. In many ways, it's considered “our most challenging unit,” says Retreat President and CEO Louis Josephson. And efforts to find funding for physical upgrades have thus far been unsuccessful. Nevertheless, Retreat administrators say they're making some big improvements on Tyler 3 - and elsewhere on the sprawling campus - by implementing two new programs that change how patients are treated for mental-health and substance-abuse problems. The...
The Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel met 19 times before Nov. 8, 2016. But everything changed that day, when Entergy announced a tentative deal to sell Vermont Yankee to NorthStar Group Services, a New York-based decommissioning company. Given NorthStar's plan to greatly accelerate decommissioning of the Vernon plant, some are wondering whether a panel that's supposed to advise state government and “serve as a conduit for public information” can do its job without additional resources - most likely from...
Next month, Interstate 91 drivers will get a firsthand look at a long-awaited, $60 million bridge. According to a schedule submitted to state legislators, two northbound lanes on the new I-91 bridge in Brattleboro are expected to open March 13. One southbound lane will be available in late April, the state Agency of Transportation's schedule says. And all four lanes finally will be open in mid-June. Given that the project and its accompanying traffic bottleneck has lasted much longer than...
Windham Southeast Supervisory Union's already arduous Act 46 deliberations may be getting even more difficult. Dummerston voters on Feb. 21 again rejected Vernon's proposed withdrawal from a regional educational union, thus closing a door that had been opened in an attempt to find a solution to Windham Southeast's school merger stalemate. Voters cast 169 ballots against Vernon's withdrawal from Brattleboro Union High School District No. 6, compared with 150 in favor. Vernon School Board Chairman Mike Hebert, who's also a...
After a difficult 2016, things are looking up at Mount Snow. Parent company Peak Resorts says season-pass sales and skier visits are up dramatically this season companywide, and the Dover resort is no exception. That news comes just a few months after Mount Snow gained access to $52 million in EB-5 foreign investment funds, which will fuel major construction projects starting in the spring. Both of those developments were mentioned in a mid-season update issued by Peak Resorts President and...
