A group of New York-based nursing home investors has dropped its effort to purchase five of the state's largest and most troubled facilities.

Priority Healthcare Group withdrew its application to the Vermont Agency of Human Services to assume full control of Burlington Health & Rehab and similarly named homes in Bennington, Berlin, St. Johnsbury and Springfield, according to a spokesperson for the current owner, national health care conglomerate Genesis HealthCare.
The application had been pending for more than a year. A Seven Days investigation of the buyers' backgrounds last July revealed problems at some of the homes members of the group owned in other states.

About 12 hours after Burlington city councilors agreed to hire a search firm to help find a new police chief, Mayor Miro Weinberger announced he would ignore the council's vote and pursue his own plan to select the next top cop.

In a press release Tuesday afternoon, Weinberger said council Progressives had made consensus on the search process "impossible" by refusing to take steps the mayor thinks would attract a broader pool of applicants. A monthslong search has yielded just two viable hires, the mayor has said: acting Chief Jon Murad and another unnamed candidate.

Weinberger, a Democrat, said Tuesday that he'll move forward with the two applicants, and bring a finalist to the council for a vote early next year.

"It remains within the Mayor’s authority under City Charter to select and make department head appointments, and I believe it is my duty to do so urgently," Weinberger said in the statement. "The community and our police department need a permanent chief now."

A mad rush for COVID-19 testing is under way in Vermont as residents scramble to determine whether they should gather with family and friends over the upcoming holiday weekend.

Demand for rapid tests has vastly outstripped supply in recent weeks, emptying pharmacies and leaving workers unsure when they will be restocked. Even Vermont's well-oiled state-run testing machine has been pushed to its limit: Lines are stretching out the door at popular walk-in sites, while the most populous county was booking appointments into next week.

The arrival of the highly contagious Omicron variant has raised the stakes, placing even the fully vaccinated at an increased risk of  infections and threatening to send another wave of sick patients into Vermont's strained hospitals. The variant accounted for nearly three-quarters of all U.S. cases over the last week, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, making it the dominant strain nationally fewer than eight weeks after it was first identified globally.

If Vermont cases were to jump 50 percent after the holidays — which happened last year — the state could wind up averaging 600 new infections a day, and single-day tallies could eclipse 1,000.

At a press briefing on Tuesday, state leaders urged people to take precautions whenever possible heading into the holiday weekend.

"I know many of us are eager to celebrate with loved ones that are exhausted by everything COVID keeps throwing at us, but any way we can lower the risk, the safer we will all be," said Health Commissioner Mark Levine. "We don't want the lasting memory of 2021 to be regret that our holiday gathering could have been done more safely."

A Black student who attended Twin Valley Middle High School in Whitingham said she was subjected to racially motivated bullying and harassment by peers, and that school administrators took no meaningful action to stop it.

The unidentified student's allegations were made public Tuesday, when the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont filed a complaint on her behalf with the state Human Rights Commission.

The allegations bear some similarities to others made in schools across the state this fall. Students of color in Winooski, St. Albans and South Burlington have said they were victims of racial abuse and, in some cases, criticized the way officials handled these incidents.
The Twin Valley complaint alleges that the student, identified by her initials C.B., was a sophomore and the only Black student in the school during the 2020-2021 year when she was targeted repeatedly by classmates.

In December 2020, a student allegedly called C.B. the N-word in front of a teacher and other students. The teacher informed Principal Anna Roth of the incident, and Roth started an investigation.

But the probe "resulted in no actual or tangible action," the complaint says. The perpetrator was not punished, and C.B. was told that it was her responsibility not to talk to him.

After a contentious debate on Monday, Burlington city councilors agreed to hire a search firm to help find a new police chief — a step that Mayor Miro Weinberger had demanded amid a stalled process that turned up just two viable candidates.

The vote was just one of many on a packed city council agenda, which also included deliberations on short-term rentals, overdose-prevention sites, property tax relief and more.

The police chief resolution says the city will allocate $75,000 toward hiring a firm, which will work with a city search committee to identify a finalist by March 2022. The measure passed on a narrow 6-5 margin that fell on party lines, with independent Councilor Ali Dieng (Ward 7) joining five Progressives in favor. Councilor Perri Freeman (P-Central District) was absent.

Weinberger called the resolution "extremely disappointing." In a November memo, the mayor had also said the council should offer a higher salary range for the position; hire a recruiter and public information officer for the department; and allow the new chief to maintain authority over officer discipline.
But the Progs wouldn’t budge.

“It is very problematic and disrespectful to the people of Burlington who have serious concerns about public safety and are basically just being played games with here,” Weinberger said.

The Champlain Housing Trust has purchased the Days Inn in Shelburne and plans eventually to relocate its transitional housing program at Harbor Place across Shelburne Road to the hotel property. Harbor Place, meantime, will be turned into 100 units of permanent housing.

The purchase is the second in a month for Champlain Housing Trust. On November 30, the trust purchased a Marriott in Williston, TownePlace Suites, to shelter formerly homeless and low-income Vermonters.

The trust, a nonprofit, owns and manages housing for more than 3,000 families or individuals in Chittenden, Franklin, and Grand Isle Counties.

The trust plans to convert hotel rooms at Harbor Place into apartments, and to add one apartment building and one set of townhouses and condominiums at that property, said Chris Donnelly, the director of community relations for the trust. Ultimately, the projects will create about 40 more apartments overall, Donnelly said.

The trust brought the proposal before Shelburne's development review board last week.

Donnelly said the trust would not have been able to purchase the hotels without the federal COVID-19 relief money that lawmakers and the governor's office directed to housing projects this year. The state used the Days Inn for people experiencing homelessness, but the property had been emptied recently as those programs ended, Donnelly said. The housing trust paid $6 million for the property, and will use a $7.34 million grant for the purchase and renovation costs. It's expected to be ready for its new residents in February or March.
The housing created at the Harbor Place project will be permanent, Donnelly said.

“We’re actually providing a solution to homelessness,” he said. A motel room, often with no kitchen facilities, can only be a temporary measure;  the permanent units will have a kitchen and other amenities. “It provides a security of tenure, stability and a home,” he said.

Champlain Housing Trust is a member of Building Homes Together, a regional effort created to address the shortage of affordable housing in northwestern Vermont. On December 14, that group launched a campaign to build 5,000 new homes, with 1,250 of them designated as permanently affordable, over the next five years. Housing advocates generally describe affordable housing as consuming one-third of a family’s income.
Donnelly said the trust is planning or developing about 700 homes, including those at Harbor Place. The COVID-19 relief money, which is administered through the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board, has jump-started the trust’s efforts to buy and build apartments, he said.

The trust now owns eight former hotels and motels in Chittenden County, and Donnelly said it's looking for more properties.

“There is an opportunity ahead to improve a lot of peoples’ lives," he said. 

Burlington Democrats will run candidates in five of the eight city council races in March.

The party finalized its slate Sunday night during a virtual nominating caucus for Town Meeting elections, when all eight “ward” seats are up for grabs. The council has 12 total members.

The Democratic crop includes incumbent councilors Karen Paul (D-Ward 6) and Sarah Carpenter (D-Ward 4), along with newcomers Ben Traverse in Ward 5; Aleczander Stith in Ward 7; and Hannah King in Ward 8.

All of the candidates ran unopposed in the caucus, and most vowed to address housing affordability and enact public safety reforms if elected.

Mayor Miro Weinberger, a fellow Democrat, said the choice is clear for voters.

“If voters want racial justice and public safety,” he said at the beginning of the caucus, “if voters want competent, responsible government to deliver to the people in this community, they need to elect Democrats."

Vermont has confirmed its first case of the highly contagious Omicron COVID-19 variant.

The specimen was collected on December 8 from a Lamoille County resident in their 30s, the state health department said Saturday, adding that the individual was fully vaccinated and has been experiencing mild symptoms.

“We knew it was only a matter of time before we saw Omicron in our state,” Health Commissioner Mark Levine said in a press release.

Friday, December 17, 2021