Tuesday, November 19, 2019
Burlington joins St. Albans, Bennington and more than 2,500 cities, counties and Native American tribes in the “multi-district lawsuit” that will be heard in U.S. District Court in Ohio. By taking no formal action Monday night, the Burlington City Council automatically enrolled the city in the suit against 13 defendants, including Purdue Pharma, Cardinal Health, McKesson Corporation, Cephalon, CVS, Rite Aid and others.
“This is unlike any previous mass tort litigation," Burlington City Attorney Eileen Blackwood wrote in a memo to the council. "Individual cities, town[s], and counties across the country are pursuing claims against the same major defendants to recover money to help fight the epidemic and fund prevention and treatment programs."
Tags: Burlington City Council , opioids , lawsuit , Web Only , Image
Monday, November 18, 2019
But a recently retired St. Albans cop told investigators conducting a criminal probe into the matter that he'd alerted Taylor about the altercation the day after it happened.
“I have no reason to lie about this. I know what I did,” Paul Morits told Seven Days in an interview Monday. “Whether [Taylor] wants to admit it or not, that will be on his conscience.”
Morits, a corporal, provided the alternate timeline in sworn testimony to the Vermont State Police, who began investigating former sergeant Jason Lawton in August, at Taylor's request. Lawton was arrested last week and charged with simple assault; he pleaded not guilty to the charge in Franklin County Superior Court on Monday.
The charge stems from a March 14 incident during which Lawton slugged a handcuffed and intoxicated Amy Connelly inside a holding cell at the St. Albans Police Department. Connelly, who'd been arrested earlier that night at a local bar, was taken to the hospital.
Tags: Gary Taylor , St. Albans Police , Jason Lawton , Amy Connelly , use of force , Web Only , Image
Friday, November 15, 2019
An official city notice hanging against the building's south wall warns that "no camping is permitted at this location at any time."
Posted November 1, the notice says that any belongings found on the site after 8 a.m. November 4 would be removed.
"If you do not stop camping or if you return to camp at this spot after it is cleaned up the city may pursue legal action against you," the notice added.
Burlington City Attorney Eileen Blackwood said the advisory was posted after someone used the code enforcement website SeeClickFix to report blankets, a lawn chair and trash in the bushes next to city hall.
In an email, Blackwood said that "individuals known to be homeless had been gathering in that area earlier in the fall but the items had been left unattended."
Tags: Burlington , City Hall Park , homeless , Dragon , encampment , Web Only , Image
Thursday, November 14, 2019
Describing a hypothetical situation, del Pozo writes that officers almost always point a gun at a knife-wielding person and shout commands. If the person advances, the officers shoot, and everyone loses, he writes.
"Each year, American police officers shoot and kill well over 125 people armed with knives, many of them in this manner," del Pozo writes. "The public has grown impatient with seeing the same approach produce a predictably tragic result."
The chief urges his counterparts around the nation to start training officers as if their weapons were "insurance policies" rather than "persuasive devices," and suggests that American police take lessons from their unarmed colleagues across the pond.
Tags: Burlington , Brandon del Pozo , police , guns , Perri Freeman , city council , Web Only , Image
Gov. Phil Scott on Thursday announced the latest round of grants in the state’s Vermont Phosphorus Innovation Challenge, which was launched in 2018 as an XPrize-style competition.
The goal is to harness the power of the private sector to help find innovative solutions to problems created by too much phosphorus in the watershed, such as the dangerous algae blooms that close beaches in the summer and keep tourists at bay.
“The bottom line is, we have more phosphorus going into our watersheds than we take out, resulting in excessive phosphorus in our environments,” Scott said.
Tags: Pollution , phosphorus , dairy , Julie Moore , Phil Scott , governor , clean water , Web Only , Image
The Vermont Attorney General's Office will charge Jason Lawton, the former St. Albans police officer who punched a handcuffed woman in the face, with simple assault, Vermont State Police announced.
Lawton was arrested and processed Thursday morning after a "lengthy investigation," state police said in a press release. The St. Albans Police Department cooperated in the probe, state police said.
Lawton will be arraigned November 18 in Franklin County Superior Court for the misdemeanor charge. He faces up to a year in jail and $1,000 in fines.
Tags: Jason Lawton , St. Albans police , Gary Taylor , Amy Connelly , punch , simple assault , Web Only , Image , Video
University of Vermont President Suresh Garimella announced Thursday morning that the school is freezing tuition at current levels for next year.
The move will hold true for undergraduate and graduate students, and for both Vermonters and students from out of state, in a budget that he will present to trustees, he announced.
Undergraduate tuition costs $16,392 for Vermonters and $41,280 for others, according to UVM's Student Financial Services. Room and board, books and other expenses bring that to about $35,220 for Vermont students and $60,468 for those from out of state.
Funding a college education is one of the largest expenditures families face in the United States, Garimella said, and too many families “are getting squeezed.”
“This is why today I am announcing that I will present to the board of trustees a zero tuition increase for next year,” Garimella said.
He called it an historic decision, and noted that the timing of the announcement comes as many high school seniors are filling out college applications. He urged them to “think about the amazing institution UVM is.”
Tags: University of Vermont , Suresh Garimella , tuition freeze , UVM , Purdue , Web Only , Image
Wednesday, November 13, 2019
“Now there is one witness, one witness that they won’t bring in front of us — they won’t bring in front of the American people,” Jordan said. “And that’s the guy who started it all: the whistleblower.”
He was referring to the unnamed Central Intelligence Agency analyst who first sounded the alarm in August that Trump may have halted military aid to Ukraine in order to secure an investigation of former vice president Joe Biden. “This anonymous so-called whistleblower,” Jordan continued, “who is the reason we’re all sitting here today — we’ll never get a chance to question that individual.”
Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) saw his opening. “I’d say to my colleague,” Welch said, turning to face Jordan, “I’d be glad to have the person who started it all come in and testify.” He gestured to the witness chair. “President Trump is welcome to take a seat right there.”
Tags: impeachment , peter welch , donald trump , congress , Web Only , Image
Terms of the sale, announced Wednesday, weren't disclosed. It comes two years after Alterra first broke into Vermont with its purchase of Stratton Mountain Resort. The Colorado company now owns 15 mountains in North America.
Win Smith, Sugarbush's owner since 2001, said in an interview that he had turned down several previous offers to sell the resort, taking pride in keeping the ski area “fiercely” independent. But even as he comes off a “record” year, he worried that the trend of consolidation will only make it harder for independent resorts to compete. Vail and its multi-resort Epic Pass, for instance, staked its claim to the state in 2017 when it paid $50 million for Stowe Mountain Resort. The company bought Mount Snow in Dover and several other New England ski areas in a deal earlier this year.
Sugarbush partnered with Alterra last year with that in mind, joining the Ikon Pass system, which gives patrons access to all of the larger company’s respective resorts. But Smith said he wasn’t confident the partnership would continue on the same terms, and he knew that Alterra could eventually decide that it owns enough mountains.
“You kind of have to strike when the iron’s hot,” said Smith, a former Merrill Lynch executive.
Tags: sugarbush , alterra , vermont ski resorts , sale , purchase , Win Smith , Phil Scott , Adam Greshin , Warren , Vail , Stowe , Web Only , Image
The case, heard by Massachusetts U.S. District Judge Denise J. Casper, involved 11 plaintiffs who were searched at ports of entry around the U.S. That includes the Vermont-Québec border, where Ghassan and Nadia Alasaad were detained for six hours along with their 11-year-old daughter while traveling on a family vacation two years ago. The Alasaads are naturalized U.S. citizens who live in Massachusetts.
Esha Bhandari, staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, said in a press release that the ruling “significantly advances Fourth Amendment protections" for millions of international travelers who enter the country each year.
Tags: border patrol , immigration , President Donald Trump , ICE , lawsuit , electronic searches , Web Only , Image