Friday, September 13, 2019
In handcuffs and leg shackles, Aita Gurung spent the hourlong session staring straight ahead as prosecutors and his defense team argued about whether he should be kept in the custody of the state’s Department of Mental Health or Department of Corrections as his case progresses.
He’s been kept in a "locked, secure facility" since his arrest in October 2017, first at the Vermont Psychiatric Care Hospital in Berlin and recently at a facility in Middlesex, his public defender, Sandra Lee, said during the arraignment. She argued for keeping him there.
“It is uncontested that he suffers from a severe mental illness, judge,” Lee said. “And the humane, fair way to address this issue is to have close court oversight and allow the court the opportunity to determine if jail is really necessary before putting him through that for charges that were dismissed previously by the State of Vermont.”
Tags: Aita Gurung , Burlington , meat cleaver , murder , T.J. Donovan , Web Only , Image
Monday, September 9, 2019
Rosanne Greco and Roger Bourassa, both retired military officers, were eventually cited for trespass — but only after Burlington police deputy chief Jon Murad tried for 30 minutes to persuade them to leave voluntarily by citing political theorists.
Tags: F-35s , Burlington International Airport , Air National Guard , Sen. Patrick Leahy , Rosanne Greco , Roger Bourassa , Web Only , Image
Mayor Miro Weinberger introduced the “Net Zero Energy Roadmap” to a packed City Hall, telling the crowd that Burlington can “show the country that another future is possible.”
The roadmap lays out four ways to get there. According to the plan, Burlington can reduce 60 percent of its dependence on fossil fuels by encouraging Burlington Electric Department customers to switch to electric heat. It can shave off another 20 percent if drivers transition to fully electric or hybrid vehicles.
An additional 15 percent would be cut once Burlington installs a district energy system, which would capture steam from the Joseph C. McNeil Generating Station to provide heat for large energy customers such as the University of Vermont Medical Center. The final 5 percent could be achieved by drivers choosing alternative modes of transportation, according to the plan.
In all, the roadmap calls for the city to use 65 percent more renewable electric energy to meet the 2030 goal. The plan was a cornerstone of Weinberger's 2019 State of the City address, when he called it "the most ambitious climate goal of any city in America."
Tags: net zero , district energy , Miro Weinberger , Burlington Electric Department , Web Only , Image
Friday, September 6, 2019
The company has leased the 3,000-square-foot commercial space on the first floor of Redstone's building at 316 Flynn Avenue in Burlington. Small Dog will vacate its current location at 100 Dorset Street by month's end and open up shop in Burlington in October, according to general manager Emily Dolloff.
“The space is being completely fit up for our needs, so it’s a brand new space, a brand new design,” she said. “We’re really excited we’re going to be better able to serve retail and customers.”
The space is comparable in size to Small Dog's existing SoBu showroom. The company's landlord informed Small Dog in May that its lease, which expires September 30, would not be renewed “for reasons that were not disclosed to us,” Dolloff said. The landlord offered to rent them the former Eastern Mountain Sports storefront, but “we figured it was time” to move, Dolloff said.
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Tuesday, September 3, 2019
Leahy, flanked by Levine, announced the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grant at the Vermont Health Department in Burlington.
Vermont has faced up to the challenge better than other rural areas, Leahy said, "but more needs to be done."
"I think we all know that the opioid crisis is the most complex public health challenge of our time," Levine said. Over the past five years, Vermont has built a strong intervention, prevention and treatment infrastructure, he continued.
"But there's much more we can do to turn what we know, data, into life-saving action," the state's health commissioner said.
Tags: Patrick Leahy , senator , Mark Levin , Vermont Department of Health , commissioner , opioids , Web Only , Image
Friday, August 30, 2019
A leak has knocked out gas service to most Church Street, Burlington businesses in the middle of the dinner rush hour, Vermont Gas officials confirmed Friday evening as Labor Day weekend kicked off.
S.D. Ireland construction workers accidentally hit a gas line on St. Paul Street between King and Maple streets around 3:30 p.m., city Public Works director Chapin Spencer told Seven Days. Crews were excavating to build a sidewalk as part of the ongoing street reconstruction project when they broke the line, he said. No one was injured.
Vermont Gas responded and shut off gas service to repair the line, company spokesperson Beth Parent said. After repairs, crews will visit each customer and reset their service before the gas line is fully restored. That could take several hours, Parent said after 6 p.m.
"We understand and appreciate their patience," she added. "We know this is not convenient, but safety is our No. 1 priority."
Tags: Burlington , gas leak , SD Ireland , Church Street , Web Only , Image
Franco declined to specify the reasons for Nikki Fuller's medical leave, citing privacy concerns, and Fuller declined to comment.
Burlington Superintendent of Schools Yaw Obeng said via email that Fuller stopped working under the Family and Medical Leave Act on May 20. She drew her $118,816 annual salary for the next 12 weeks.
Fuller has since exhausted her paid leave time and is no longer drawing a salary, according to Obeng, who responded to Seven Days' public records request about Fuller's employment status.
Tags: Burlington , schools , diversity , Nikki Fuller , Web Only , Image
Thursday, August 29, 2019
With the arrival of the next generation fighters just weeks away, critics led by Rosanne Greco, a retired Air Force colonel, are demanding the secretary of the Air Force block the basing of the plane at Burlington International Airport until new sound studies can be conducted.
They argue that sound studies predicting how the fighter would affect the area assumed that the jets would use their afterburners less than 5 percent of time. New documents, however, suggest afterburner usage might be 10 times that much — or more, Greco said.
“The Air Force finally had to admit to the public what they knew for a long time — that at the large Air Force bases where the F-35 is currently flying … they are taking off in afterburner 50 to 100 percent of the time,” Greco said at a press conference Thursday outside Sen. Patrick Leahy's (D-Vt.) Burlington office.
Tags: F-35 , U.S. Air Force , Vermont Air National Guard , Rosanne Greco , Web Only , Image
Monday, August 26, 2019
Weinberger had hoped to soon see project plans and illustrations and hear how Brookfield Asset Management would minimize the impacts on neighbors who are tired of the hole in the middle of downtown. But he didn’t get his wish at Monday night’s city council meeting, which marked the first time since July that representatives from Brookfield have spoken publicly about their plans for Burlington’s infamous pit.
Instead, their comments amounted to what some councilors called a “non-update update.”
Brookfield vice president of development Aanen Olsen told councilors what they’ve heard many times before: The multimillion-dollar Burlington Town Center redevelopment is a large and complex undertaking that is currently in litigation, which limits what developers can say publicly.
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Thursday, August 22, 2019
The owners of Ridin' High Skate Shop, John Van Hazinga and Samantha Steady, face federal conspiracy charges for growing marijuana and selling it out of their eccentric Burlington storefront, according to an indictment unsealed Thursday.
It's the second downtown business to be raided this year for dealing pot.
The feds allege Van Hazinga, also known as "Big John," and Steady ran a grow operation at their Underhill home, then sold the drug and THC-infused edibles out of their skateboard shop at the corner of Pearl and Battery streets, within sight of the Burlington police headquarters.
Tags: Cannabeat , John Van Hazinga , Ridin' High , Burlington , DEA , cannabis , marijuana , Web Only , Image