Wednesday, September 28, 2016
In the seven weeks since Lt. Gov. Phil Scott won his party’s gubernatorial primary, a super PAC funded by the Republican Governors Association has been flooding the airwaves with positive television advertisements.
On Wednesday, the national GOP group went negative — releasing a tough new ad labeling Democratic nominee Sue Minter as a protégé of retiring Gov. Peter Shumlin, whom it refers to as a failure. The spot features bobblehead dolls loosely resembling the two Democrats.
The size of the ad buy was not immediately clear. But according to a disclosure filed Monday with the Secretary of State’s Office, the super PAC, called A Stronger Vermont, spent $244,362 last Friday on media placement. That same disclosure indicated that the RGA had transferred another $600,000 to its super PAC in September, bringing its total investment in the race to $1.2 million.
Tags: Republican Governors Association , Sue Minter , Phil Scott , Peter Shumlin , Image , Video , Web Only
The State Department has approved the resettlement of Syrian refugees in Rutland, according to the Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program.
"The Syrians are coming to Rutland, Vermont! This outcome was expected, Rutland is a welcoming community," according to a statement posted on the VRRP's Facebook page. The agency is a field office of the U.S Committee for Refugees and Immigrants.
It isn't clear when the first Syrians will arrive in Rutland, but VRRP hopes that the resettlement will begin before the end of the year. The agency also said that there will be an office in Rutland with trained staff to help the Syrians settle in their new country.
Tags: Rutland , resettlement program , Chris Louras , Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program , Syrian refugees , Image , Web Only
Tuesday, September 27, 2016
A southern Vermont man is at the center of a bizarre story involving a doomed fishing trip off the coast of Rhode Island.
Nathan Carman, 22, who lives in Vernon, made it ashore alive after spending a week adrift in the ocean aboard an inflatable life raft. His mother, 54-year-old Linda Carman, remains missing — and is presumed dead.
On Monday, police searched Carman’s home, looking for evidence that he knew the boat was unseaworthy before he took his mother out on a deep-sea fishing expedition, according to a warrant obtained by WVNY/WFFF-TV. Such evidence would support a charge of “operating so as to endanger, causing death,” the warrant says.
Carman was once a suspect in the still-unsolved 2013 murder of his 87-year-old grandfather, who was gunned down in his Connecticut home, according to the Hartford Courant. Carman was the last known person to see John Chakalos alive.
Tags: Nathan Carman , Vernon , missing boat , Coast Guard , Image , Audio , Web Only
"Notice Trump sniffing all the time," he wrote on Twitter. "Coke user?"
Rather than apologize for the off-color tweet the next day, the former practicing physician doubled down on it Tuesday afternoon in an appearance on MSNBC.Notice Trump sniffing all the time. Coke user?
— Howard Dean (@GovHowardDean) September 27, 2016
"Well, you can't make a diagnosis over the television," he said. "I would never do that. But he has some interesting — that is actually a signature of people who use cocaine. I'm not suggesting that Trump does, but—"
"Well you are suggesting it, actually, in a tweet," MSNBC host Kate Snow interjected.
"No, I'm suggesting we think about it," Dean said. Then he rattled off a list of symptoms he said Trump shared with cocaine users, ranging from "grandiosity" to "delusions" to "trouble with pressured speech."
Tags: Howard Dean , Donald Trump , Image , Video , Web Only
As drivers honked noisily in support, teachers on both sides of the busy road waved signs reading "Return to the Table." They chanted: "Hey ho, hey ho, imposition has got to go," referring to the employment policy the city school board imposed on them recently.
Burlington Education Association president Fran Brock thanked teachers for rallying together and chastised the imposition of employment terms.
"Basically it's an evil sort of thing to do," she told the crowd of teachers as they wrapped up the picket shortly after 5 p.m. "They are trying to bust the union and we're not going to let them do it!" Teachers cheered.
Tags: Burlington Education Association , Frank Brock , Image , Web Only
When Vermont Supreme Court Justice John Dooley announced his retirement last Thursday, several news outlets reported that Gov. Peter Shumlin’s successor would name the long-serving judge’s replacement. Dooley’s term expires next March — two months after Shumlin is scheduled to leave office.
But according to the governor’s spokeswoman, Sue Allen, “The governor plans to interview qualified candidates and name a successor to Justice Dooley this fall.”
Since last Thursday, Allen dodged repeated questions from Seven Days about Shumlin’s intentions. On Tuesday, she said that the governor’s staff had been researching the matter and consulting with legislative leaders about the process.
“As it turns out, the statute and [Judicial Nominating Board] rules are clear: when a Supreme Court justice announces they will not be a candidate for retention, the nominating board — upon notification by the governor of the vacancy — ‘shall’ initiate the process to send candidates to the governor,” she said.
Allen added that the board, which includes members appointed by the governor, the House, the Senate and the Vermont Bar Association, is “prepared to accept applications and make recommendations to fill the seat on the Supreme Court.”
Tags: John Dooley , Vermont Supreme Court , Peter Shumlin , Phil Scott , Sue Minter , Image , Web Only
The council voted 9-1 Monday night to put a $21.8 million TIF proposal on the November ballot. If residents approve the measure, the money will be used to restore St. Paul and Pine Streets, which are currently cut off by the Burlington Town Center, and to upgrade nearby public infrastructure — all part of a massive downtown mall redevelopment project.
TIF is a funding mechanism that allows municipalities to pay for public infrastructure improvements that encourage new public or private development. The upgrades are financed with debt that gets repaid by the future growth in property tax revenue from the developments.
The lone 'no' vote came from Progressive Max Tracy, who said the city was still working with incomplete information. He also objected to plans to pay mall owner Don Sinex for the full value of the streets’ right-of-ways, estimated at $1.9 million, suggesting the city could strike a better bargain.
Ahead of the vote, the council reviewed a feasibility report from a Norwich firm called Doug Kennedy Advisors that concluded the Burlington Town Center redevelopment is financially viable. Sinex had commissioned the report at the city’s request. Parts of it — including anticipated lease and rent rates — are not being released to the public.
The city also hired its own firm, ECONorthwest, to review the report. It came to the same conclusion but suggested the report could have provided more information about the financing of the project and also could have better examined how competing commercial and residential developments might affect the project.
Tags: Burlington Town Center , Don Sinex , Burlington city council , Miro Weinberger , Image , Web Only
Monday, September 26, 2016
Lyndon State College faculty and alumni groups are asking the Vermont State Colleges Board of Trustees to postpone this week’s scheduled vote on a plan to merge Johnson and Lyndon state colleges.
There will be no delay, however, said Tricia Coates, director of external and governmental affairs for Vermont State Colleges.
“We believe the report that the chancellor is submitting to the board will respond to their concerns,” Coates said.
The trustees are scheduled to vote Thursday on a plan to put the two state colleges under one president with one budget and a new name while retaining separate campuses. Faculty, staff and students have expressed concerns that the move is happening too quickly and with questions left unanswered.
Monday, the Lyndon Faculty Assembly sent chancellor Jeb Spaulding and the board a resolution asking for the vote to be delayed.
Tags: Vermont State Colleges , Lyndon State College , Johnson State College , Jeb Spaulding , Image , Web Only
A diverse sea of students, and even faculty, at the University of Vermont gathered Monday afternoon on campus to express solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement — at the very spot where a flag with the group’s motto was stolen.
More than 200 people, most dressed all in black, turned out for the “UVM Blackout,” an event planned before the weekend theft of a Black Lives Matter flag from where it flew outside the university’s Davis Center.
Student organizers Haydee Guadalupe Miranda and Akilah Ho-young set the tone of the rally by urging a message of peace. The group held a moment of silence and offered condolences to the families of victims of gun violence such as Trayvon Martin and Keith Lamont Scott, who was killed by police last week in Charlotte, N.C. The crowd went on to take pictures with the Black Lives Matter flag fluttering in the wind beside the Vermont and American flags on campus.
Tags: University of Vermont , Davis Center , Black Lives Matter , Black Lives Matter flag , Kesha Ram , Image , Video , Web Only
In a letter to embattled Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) on Friday referred to allegedly fraudulent business practices at the bank as "outrageous."
But Leahy does not appear outraged enough to return the $2,000 contribution he received from a Wells Fargo political action committee in September 2015, nor the $1,000 donation he received in May 2016.
"Support for his campaign does not affect his policy decisions and never has," Leahy campaign spokesman Jay Tilton said Friday when asked whether the senator would return the money. "He does what he thinks is right for Vermonters, and [the letter] shows it."
Asked again Friday whether that meant Leahy would keep the cash, Tilton said, "I'll let my earlier statement stand for itself."
Earlier this month, Wells Fargo agreed to pay $185 million in fines after federal regulators accused the bank of fleecing its customers. According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Wells Fargo employees opened as many as 2 million unauthorized credit card and bank accounts in their customers' names over five years and charged millions in fees.
Tags: Patrick Leahy , Wells Fargo , Scott Milne , Jay Tilton , Image , Web Only