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Your support powers every story we tell. 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.
• Paul Edward Collier, 68, of Westminster. Died at home Sept. 15, 2026, surrounded by loved ones after a courageous battle with Alzheimers. Born March 28, 1958, in New Haven, Connecticut, to Donald “Pete” Collier and Edith (Boyles) Collier, Paul was raised in Seymour, Connecticut, and attended Emmett O’Brien Regional Vocational Technical High School, graduating in 1976 with a focus on carpentry. In 1981, Paul relocated to Westminster, where he worked at both Springfield Fence Co. and as an EMT at LeFevre Ambulance. He then jumpstarted his career with employment at Fellows Gear Shaper, where he discovered his love of machine tool sharpening. He later became the owner of The Cutter Shop in Springfield, where he not only ground a variety of different tools, but also worked with Burton Snowboards designing tooling used to make a prototype for their first snowboards. He was also proud to have both designed and created an intricate part for the International Space Station that is currently still in use. He was incredibly reliable, skilled, and knowledgeable, and the talent he brought to his skilled craft was unmatched. In 1989, he married Debra (Perry) Collier in Bellows Falls, sharing 37 years of marriage. He was known for having a deep love of building and flying model airplanes, snowmobiling, riding his motorcycle, long bicycle rides, completing both Sudoku and jigsaw puzzles, carpentry and fixing anything and everything that was broken, camping with family in the summer, remodeling his home (except the kitchen), and refurbishing old tractors. Paul was preceded in death by his father, father-in-law William “Bill” Perry Sr., and brother-in-law William R. Perry Jr. He will be deeply missed by his surviving family, including his wife and his three children: sons, Thomas Collier and Christopher Dryden, and daughter, Jennifer (Collier) Washburn and her...
-Cross-country has been an off-and-on fall sport at Leland & Gray over the years, but no one can remember the last time the school has hosted a varsity race at the school. That changed on Sept. 25 when the school hosted a meet that drew Brattleboro, Burr & Burton,
The writer is a member of the Steering Committee of the Rural School Community Alliance and a member of the Marlboro School Board. MARLBORO-This letter is in response to a steady push over the last two years to consolidate Vermont school districts and to close small rural schools on...
BARNET-My new film, Lost Nation, will play at Williamsville Hall in Newfane at 6:30 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 8. The film was partly shot in Newfane, where we found the perfect Ethan Allen home exterior. I’ll be at the screening — and will probably take a question regarding one of the film’s most mysterious characters, Crean Brush. Crean Brush entered Vermont history dressed for the wrong side of it. An Irish-born lawyer, Crown official, land speculator, and member of the New...
The writer represents the Windham-3 district in the Vermont House of Representatives. WESTMINSTER-I have been a state representative for the past six years. I am looking forward to working in the Legislature with a new governor who will help us bring universal primary care to our state, who will support raising revenue to fund needed programs and reduce taxes through raising the tax rate on the 1%, and who will do so much more! That person should be Amanda Janoo,
Dan DeWalt, a frequent contributor to these pages and one of the founders of this newspaper, writes that if he didn't love his country, he "wouldn't spend so much time trying to get it to live up to its purported principles." NEWFANE-Free speech - the very essence of America's mythic "exceptionalism"- is under assault by flag-draped "patriots" who are undermining our rights and freedoms by enabling fascist white nationalism and corporate hegemony to reach ascendancy. Under the guise of concerns...
-Vermont filmmaker Bess O’Brien had finished her last documentary — the 2024 on-the-ground look at food and housing insecurity, Just Getting By — when she hungered for a change. “A lot of my films through the years have tackled big issues,” recalled O’Brien, whose feature about drug use disorder, The Hungry Heart, made national news after it inspired then-Gov. Peter Shumlin’s 2014 State of the State address. “Going into this next election cycle and where we are right now in...
WESTMINSTER-I can speak from personal experience that there are already problems with absentee ballots. I recently received ballots for the primary election postmarked a week before the primary but did not receive them for more than two weeks later. I can't say they were deliberately slowed down, but it is coincidental that they took so long to reach me, only two states away. I had made arrangements for them to be returned by hand, but that wasn't sufficient. Allow a...
BRATTLEBORO-The annual Lego Contest & Exhibit will return to Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC) Thursday through Monday, Oct. 8–12, with an awards ceremony Thursday, Oct. 8, at 5:30 p.m. at the museum, 10 Vernon St. In addition to a Best in Show award, BMAC will offer prizes by age group, and local business will sponsor awards for the best vehicle, best home or building, best use of light or color, and best use of moving parts. “The goal of...
PUTNEY-The Alasdair Fraser Band will perform a contemporary fusion of Scottish and Spanish traditional music Thursday, Oct. 8, at 7 p.m. at Next Stage Arts, 15 Kimball Hill. The band is a new family collaboration led by celebrated Scottish fiddler Alasdair Fraser. His wife, María San Miguel, is a Spanish Castilian fiddler, vocalist, and panderetera. She also performs in the duo San Miguel Fraser with Alasdair’s son Galen Fraser, who plays fiddle and cittern. Cameron Fraser, Alasdair’s other son, rounds...
MARLBORO-Choro Camp New England will present Brazilian choro and samba music Saturday, Oct. 3, at 7:30 p.m. at The Campus at Marlboro Music, 2582 South Rd. Musicians will include the band Água de Moringa and singer Mariana Baltar, both based in Rio de Janeiro and performing in the U.S. for the first time, as well as three U.S.-based artists: clarinetist Anat Cohen; Vitor Gonçalves, who plays piano and accordion; and Skye Soto Steele, a violinist who also plays rabeca, a...
BRATTLEBORO-St. Michael’s Episcopal Church has begun its new year with the start of Sunday School, weekly choir rehearsals, and other activities. The church is located at 16 Bradley Ave. “Back to school means back to formation programs for children and youth,” said St. Michael’s rector, the Rev. Mary Lindquist, in a news release. Sunday School offerings are: nursery care (up to age 3); Godly Play (ages 3–9), a Montessori-inspired Christian formation program; and Youth Group (grades 7 to 12) on...
BRATTLEBORO-David and Shirley Emery of Vernon were named the Brattleboro Region Chamber of Commerce’s Community People of the Year at the Chamber’s annual awards night Sept. 24 at the Brattleboro Country Club. The Emerys, grade-school sweethearts who’ve been married 53 years, were a natural choice for the Chamber’s honors. Called “two people who’ve never really been off duty,” by Chamber Board Member Steve Wolf, the Emerys have offered many decades of service to the community in ways big and small.
WESTMINSTER WEST-I recently got a flat tire on my rusty, '06 Subaru, which I needed to get to work. I called every store in the area - according to my phone - and not one would sell me a single tire. Every one of the "associates" told me they were prevented - by law - from selling me a single tire: I had to come up with $800 for four brand new tires before I could get back on the...
BRATTLEBORO-Three area choruses will join to perform the hour-long oratorio A Passion for the Planet Saturday, Oct. 3., at 7 p.m. at the Latchis Theatre, 50 Main St. The Brattleboro Concert Choir, Connecticut Choral Artists (CONCORA), and the Brattleboro Music Center (BMC) Children’s Chorus will perform the 11-movement piece, composed by Geoffrey Hudson, which addresses climate change from multiple emotional perspectives. The combined choruses comprise hundreds of voices, according to a news release. A Passion for the Planet “traces an...
VERNON-PowerTransitions officials who held another community meeting on Sept. 23 faced community members who filled the Governor Hunt House’s meeting room, expressing skepticism and concern that Vernon could become home to an expensive, potentially hazardous energy installation. Employees at the Texas-based company, which recently signed an option lease agreement with NorthStar to install an energy project on the 140-acre site of the former Vermont Yankee Nuclear plant, arrived at the Governor Hunt House prepared to take feedback on a potential...
BELLOWS FALLS-The Saxtons River Art Guild will offer a watercolor workshop, “Autumn on the River,” Saturday, Oct. 3, from 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. at the United Church of Bellows Falls, 8 School St. Dummerston artist Trish Murtha will lead the workshop, which “is suitable for artists in any media and at any level,” according to a news release. Murtha’s work celebrates the seasonal cycles and is “filled with vivid color, strong values, and shapes that capture textured meadows, mountains,
Kids can design plates, bowls BRATTLEBORO — Brooks Memorial Library’s annual Design-A-Plate activity will once again let kids create an 8-inch melamine plate, a 10-inch melamine plate, or a melamine bowl. Participants can stop by the Children’s Room to pick up a packet with everything for kids to create drawings at home. Return the packet to the library with exact payment ($8 per item, cash or check) by 8 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 20. Plates and bowls will be ready for...
BRATTLEBORO-Monday, Sept. 21 was the most solemn and rigorous Jewish holy day of the year: Yom Kippur. A Brattleboro Area Jewish Community (BAJC) member was walking through our cemetery that day. She found antisemitic graffiti - "Epstein work [sic] with Israel" - defacing the sign that clearly marked the area as a Jewish cemetery. Our community is sharing this incident with greater Brattleboro to shed light on the fact that antisemitism exists here, as it does around the world. Brattleboro...
WEST BRATTLEBORO-On Thursday, Oct. 1, from 5 to 7 p.m., Bonnyvale Environmental Education Center (BEEC) invites the community to raise a glass, have a snack, tour the farmhouse, and engage in other ways to mark the 35th birthday of the regional hub for nature connection, community science and wildlife rehabilitation. The event will culminate with a procession and drum circle on Heifer Hill to celebrate the sunset. Established in 1991, BEEC serves more than 800 students through their environmental education...
BRATTLEBORO-I read Ann Darling's Viewpoint with growing unease. The owner of the company proposing reuse of the Vermont Yankee site for battery storage has said he wants input from the public, so that use may be gaining traction. If these batteries are for electric vehicles, they are highly toxic, and we have no technology to recycle them, much like the nuclear waste at the site. I'm tired of this piece of land, so close to a major population center, being...
NEWFANE-Recent coverage of 9/11 reminds me of Chile's own 9/11 - Sept. 11, 1973, when the Chilean military, with the full support of the U.S. government, overthrew the government of the democratically elected president Salvador Allende. Three thousand people also died in the immediate aftermath of this coup, and tens of thousands of Chileans were tortured or disappeared immediately and in the following decades by the fascist regime of Gen. Augusto Pinochet, an ally of then-President Richard Nixon and then-Secretary...
BRATTLEBORO-The 50th anniversary of River Gallery School (RGS) is gearing up for its popular “Off the Wall” exhibit opening, followed by a Nov. 7 golden anniversary gala at the Retreat Farm’s North Barn. For the art school that serves all ages, it’ll be, says Executive Director Kimberly Carmody, a combined “big birthday party and our beloved fundraiser,” back after a year off. Off the Wall offerings, which are donated by artists to raise money for RGS, can be viewed online...
BRATTLEBORO-I was heartened to see over 100 concerned citizens turn out to discuss how law-enforcement might respond if ICE comes to Brattleboro. However, I need to ask, why wait for that possibility? Our government abuse of migrants calls for immediate direct protest without delay. Williston hosts two major ICE offices that review surveillance and tips in order to abduct, jail, and deport migrants, most of whom lack criminal records and are pursuing asylum claims. Justice For All, a Windham County...
BRATTLEBORO-As a nurse, the wife of a veteran, a mother, and a grandmother I have a strong interest in seeing our state not just survive, but thrive. Before retiring, I worked as an registered nurse for 40 years. I have one son teaching in early education, one son who is a Vermont farmer, one daughter-in-law who is an elementary school teacher, and three young grandchildren. For several months my friends - retired nurses, mothers, and grandmothers like me - have...
Nicholas Boke is a freelance writer and international educational consultant. CHESTER-Things are going so well, aren't they? A week or so ago, a number of news outlets ran something to the effect that Vermont Secretary of State Sarah Copeland Hanzas had reported that, thanks to a successful multi-state federal lawsuit, the state doesn't have to provide voter registration data to the Trump administration. But this wasn't all. A day later, the Campaign Legal Center put this recent response into a...
Chip Carter, a retired television anchor, moved in 2016 to Guilford, where he volunteers with a number of community organizations and serves on the Selectboard. GUILFORD-As another Vermont election approaches, the debate over affordability is once again turning into a debate over who is to blame. I’m a Democrat. But I have grown increasingly concerned about the part Vermont’s Legislature has played in making the state more expensive to live in. Gov. Phil Scott should answer for his record after...
BRATTLEBORO-As the Charter Revision Committee presents its proposed charter to the Selectboard, one principle should be non-negotiable: Every registered voter deserves an equal voice in decisions that affect the entire town. The CRC was never opposed to Representative Town Meeting. It was never opposed to open Town Meeting. And it was never advocating for every decision to be made by all registered voters. But requiring residents to spend eight, 10, or 12 hours physically attending a meeting inevitably excludes people...
WILLIAMSVILLE-It’s Saturday morning at the newly-opened Williamsville General, and a staff of two joins proprietor Emmet Mahdavi greeting and cooking, serving and chatting up as strangers and neighbors come and go with takeout or to stay. The ample space is filled with a mix of sunlit and shaded areas. Its old beams are cleaned and waxed, a handsome canopy to the wide-planked floors lined with café tables on one wall, a large table at center, and a potpourri of chairs.
