Happy Wednesday, people. Here are the news and politics stories you'll find in the latest edition of Seven Days:

• Vermont's new health care exchange goes live in less than two weeks! In this week's cover story, Ken Picard follows five households and professional "navigators" to untangle how it will work for average Vermonters.
• St. Michael's College fired two longtime custodians, and the campus isn't happy about it. Was it a case of union busting?
• A Vermont-born political strategist is playing a major role in one of the biggest races of the year in Virginia. Some observers think he may feature in the next presidential campaign.
• In looking to revitalize its downtown, is St. Albans turning its back on a piece of history?
• And in this week's Fair Game: After an ineffective 2013 session, Vermont's gun control advocates aren't going away — now they're even hiring a high-powered lobbying firm. Plus, why are F-35s okay for Vermont if missiles aren't?

If those links aren't your style, read these stories in print or on the Seven Days app.

Cover illustration by Michael Tonn

This week's Seven Days has something new attached to it: augmented reality! Now you can interact with the old-fashioned print edition with the help of a smartphone or tablet. All you have to do is download the Layar app and scan whenever you see the little symbol, and the page will come to life. In the screenshots below, you'll see what happens to the cover...

With Layar, dancers start to dance across the paper! Whoa! We are living in the Harry Potter universe, people.

Once you're done with that, there's lots of good news and politics content for your consideration, too.

• What has Champlain Valley parents peeved? A proposal to shorten summer vacation and redistribute those days to "intersession" periods during the school year.
• The South Burlington City Council election held earlier this year was unusually contentious, and it may have included a campaign-finance violation by the council's chair.
• In Fair Game, Gov. Peter Shumlin wined and dined fellow Democratic governors and big-money donors in Manchester last weekend — but our own Paul Heintz got thrown out. (See the post below on this blog for more on that.)
• The long-dormant, waiting-for-redevelopment Moran Plant on Burlington's waterfront isn't good for much these days, but at least it makes a good muse for these artists.
• In this week's WTF column, we try to find the Indiana Jones-worthy story behind a "sacred" space that threatens to turn Norwich cadets to dust.

Six months ago, a global team of experts from IBM came to study Burlington's carbon footprint and to make recommendations for how the city could reduce its output of the so-called greenhouse gases that are changing the world's climate. Working in conjunction with the Miro Weinberger administration, the six IBMers produced a 60-page report last week that makes a half dozen policy recommendations.

None of them, however, squarely addresses what the report itself identifies as the leading source of greenhouse gas emissions: transportation — which is to say, private automobiles.

Asked why the report didn't at least mention alternate forms of transport, such as walking and cycling, Marian Lawlor, a spokeswoman for the IBM team, said, "I can't answer that question for you." She added that the three-week-long assessment "should have" paid more attention to transportation issues generally. "They just didn't bubble up" during the interviews the IBMers conducted with numerous city officials and other local leaders, Lawlor explained.

Chapin Spencer, who was director of the Local Motion alternative transportation advocacy group at the time, echoed Lawlor's comments in an interview on Monday. "I wish it would have dealt more with transportation," said Spencer, who was recently appointed head of the city's Department of Public Works.

The battle over local basing of the F-35 will soon return to a familiar arena — the Burlington city council. Last summer, councilors passed a resolution asking for more information about the planes without supporting or opposing the basing. But now F-35 opponents intend to introduce a resolution declaring the war plane unwelcome at the city-owned airport.

The four Progressives who plan to bring the resolution to a vote on October 7 face a difficult task. To win, they need to sway a majority of the 14 council members. Ward 7 councilor Tom Ayres, considered the most potentially persuadable of the seven council Democrats, said on the margins of a Wednesday press conference outside city hall that he will not vote for any resolution categorically rejecting the F-35. And that’s exactly what the Progs’ proposal would do.

But the plane’s opponents did wheel out a new political weapon on Wednesday. Three Democratic state legislators, including senate majority leader Philip Baruth (D-Chittenden, pictured), attended the anti-F-35 press event. Activists there argued that the Burlington city council has the power, as landlord of the airport, to prevent its tenant, the Vermont Air National Guard, from operating the aircraft on city property.

Baruth is the highest-ranking Democrat in the state to publicly oppose the local basing option. The Chittenden County senator has cracked the solid wall of Democratic-establishment support erected by Sen. Patrick Leahy, Gov. Peter Shumlin, Congressman Peter Welch and Mayor Miro Weinberger. Independent U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders also favors stationing the plane in Vermont, as do most local business leaders and thousands of Vermonters who have sent postcards to the Air Force urging the military to bring the F-35 to the Burlington airport.

This week's Art Hop issue is on newsstands now. But fear not, news junkies! We've got the usual bunch of news and politics, too. Here's what you'll find:

• Bicycle theft is a never-ending problem in Burlington. Would a police registry help?
• Massage parlors around Vermont were busted for offering sexual services earlier this year. This Chinese spa in Barre fell under intense scrutiny, too — but it's totally legitimate.
• Pine Street sidewalks (where they exist) always get claustrophobic during the Art Hop in Burlington. Why won't the city close off parts of the street?
• Dartmouth College students have fanned out across the Upper Valley, finding immersive, mesmerizing stories for an online literary project.
• A University of Vermont professor is drawing the lightning bolt-shaped line between reading Harry Potter books and the politics of young Americans.
• And in Fair Game: Leahy, Sanders and Welch weigh whether to support President Obama's proposal for air strikes in Syria.

What good are 60 vacated homes awaiting demolition in the high-noise zone bordering Burlington International Airport? Good for training exercises involving local police and fire teams, declares a resolution on the agenda of tonight's South Burlington City Council meeting.

Not according to some airport neighbors and at least one city councilor who recall a training exercise last year that included gunfire and grenade explosions. Several nearby residents complained not only about the simulated shootouts but also about state and local officials' failure to give advance notice that the area was to become a tactical training ground for camo-clad personnel toting automatic weapons.

Principal Bobby Riley insists both the school and the neighborhood are safe, but Jeff Sherman, a resident of one of the units in the 69-85 block of Spring Street, describes conditions there as "pretty bad." The sense of danger has grown in the 12 years he's lived there, Sherman says.

In February 2011, a domestic assault spilled onto the street in front of the elementary school, whereupon a man fired a shot that didn't hurt anyone. The students were on vacation that week, but Wheeler went into lockdown to protect the staff inside.

Paul Heintz is on vacation, so this week's scores have been tallied by Seven Days digital media manager Tyler Machado. (CONFIDENTIAL TO HEINTZ: You picked a hell of a week to take off, dude!)

So who won and lost the week in Vermont news and politics?

Stoners, Catamounts and Lake Monsters, oh my!

Here's the Scoreboard for the week of Friday, Aug. 30: 

WINNERS:

Almost Everyone — Entergy's announcement that it will shut down Vermont Yankee in 2014 was good news for everyone — except, of course, the folks who work there. Entergy saves some loot. Vermont ratepayers won't notice the difference since local utilities weren't buying its power anyway. Environmentalists will close the book on decades of activism. And nearly every political entity in Vermont (and elsewhere!) scored an easy layup — even if cheap natural gas was the final death blow for the state's sole nuclear power plant.

Pot smokers — Attorney General Eric Holder says the Justice Department won't challenge state laws legalizing marijuana. That should ease the minds of Vermont's marijuana reform opponents, including House Speaker Shap Smith. Runner-up winner: Sen. Patrick Leahy, who may have forced Holder's hand on the issue.

More winners, and losers, after the jump...

Fall is right around the corner. But until the leaves turn red and gold, people around Lake Champlain must contend with changing colors of a different sort: For the last two weeks, pea-green blooms of algae have been popping up in Missisquoi, St. Albans and Malletts bays.

“Mid-August through September is, unfortunately, what we in the business call ‘bloom season,’” says James Ehlers, executive director of the nonprofit Lake Champlain International.

Scientists have determined that early summer rain brings nutrients like phosphorus into the lake, and long stretches of sunlight facilitate photosynthesis, resulting in the pea-green film, Ehlers explains. 

“It’s not unlike April showers bring May flowers,” he says.

After you're done with the big cover story about the future of Burlington's urban farmers, dig into this week's news and politics stories:

• Sure, there's that pesky lawsuit and the everpresent street toughs, but neither is stopping Church Street's merchants. Business is booming on Burlington's pedestrian mall, with just one empty storefront left.
• Also in Burlington, here's a familiar refrain: Work on the new waterfront skate park has been delayed... again.
• Cheap natural gas might be the biggest reason Vermont Yankee is shutting down — and that's good news for Milton's NG Advantage, which trucks natural gas to off-pipeline businesses.
• Not everyone gets to go back to school. Learn how Saint Michael's College is helping first-generation students adapt to higher education.
• And in Fair Game, Paul Heintz tries to figure out just what Bruce Lisman is up to with his advocacy group, Campaign for Vermont. Lisman says he's not interested in elected office, but...

Get this issue now in print, at the links above or via our iOS app.