Friday, October 8, 2021
New owners Stephen Buckner and Drew Moll said they plan to expand the Shelburne business, which includes a showroom, a service area and about 175 boats a mile from the Shelburne boat launch.
They’re going to call on John Freeman, who started the business in 1984, if they need advice.
Tags: Small Boat Exchange , Web Only , Image
Friday, October 1, 2021
The project cleared a key hurdle on September 22 when the town’s Development Review Board approved the proposal on a 3-2 vote, despite strong opposition from neighbors.
The company hopes to move operations from the Burlington waterfront to a new 29,400-square-foot maintenance, storage and office building on the western shore of Grand Isle.
The move is part of the company's broader strategy to shift its ferry operations closer to its busiest ferry terminal at the narrow Cumberland Head crossing.
Tags: Lake Champlain Transportation , ferry , Grand Isle , maintenance , Web Only , Image
Friday, September 24, 2021
Founders Nancy and Tom Cain will still be involved in running the company, and the business will stay in Brattleboro, said Amy Zipper, HumanCo’s chief operating officer. Zipper lives in New York and has a second home in Stratton and said she, too, will be involved in running Against the Grain.
“It will grow in Brattleboro,” she said of the company, which has about 100 employees. “We love the founder’s story. We look for mission-driven companies that care about quality and taste.”
Tags: Against the Grain , HumanCo , Brattleboro , gluten-free , food , Web Only , Image
Wednesday, September 22, 2021
In a report released Wednesday, Hoffer said the Agency of Commerce and Community Development paid $117 million in federal money to 2,278 businesses in the first year of the pandemic.
The agency processed most general business applications, as well as applications for women- and minority-owned businesses with no employees.
Private businesses received up to $300,000 through the program, part of a $600 million COVID-19 relief package that Gov. Phil Scott signed into law in early 2020 using funds from the $2 trillion federal emergency stimulus measure. (Hoffer's report doesn’t cover grants from a separate program administered by the state Tax Department, which processed applications for businesses such as restaurants, bars, lodging, retail and entertainment.)
Tags: Agency of Commerce and Community Development , COVID-19 , grants , Doug Hoffer , Lindsay Kurrle , Web Only , Image
Tuesday, September 14, 2021
The budget will allow the hospital to collect an additional 6 percent — or $200 million — in net patient revenue. That's well above the 3.5 percent ceiling that the board had recommended for fiscal year 2022. Even as they approved it, the regulators expressed unease at the steep insurance charge hike, which will likely lead to higher prices for ratepayers.
But the board ultimately decided that the medical center needed the additional revenue to confront its long-standing access problems, which were thrust back into the public eye earlier this month in a Seven Days cover story.
“What's kept me up at night is that approving a 6 percent commercial rate is really tough to swallow,” said board member Jessica Holmes. “But what’s tougher for me to swallow is thinking that if we reduce it below that, we as a board will be ... limiting the resources necessary for the medical center to address what I think we all see now as a patient access crisis.”
Tags: UVM Medical Center , Green Mountain Care Board , patient access crisis , Web Only , Image
Thursday, September 9, 2021
In Vermont, deals of around $5 million still garner notice. That $110 million is more than all of the combined venture investing in 31 companies in the state last year, said Cairn Cross, whose Shelburne company, FreshTracks Capital, was a minor player in the DealerPolicy deal.
The move could draw interest and build confidence in companies based in Chittenden County and in Vermont, said Jeff Couture of the Vermont Technology Alliance.
“Investment draws other investment, or at least draws the attention” of people who keep track of business deals nationally, said Couture. He noted that some employees drawn to Vermont by the fast-growing Dealer.com software company years ago started their own businesses in town. Dealer.com was eventually sold, the second time to Cox Automotive in 2015 in a $4 billion deal.
“I hope it’s the beginning of more to come” for other Vermont companies, Couture said.
Tags: DealerPolicy , economic development , venture capital , Travis Fitzgerald , Jeff Mongeon , Web Only , Image
Wednesday, September 8, 2021
SunCommon is the state's largest provider of residential and commercial solar energy systems. iSun is the largest industrial and utility-scale solar business, according to the companies.
Tags: Suncommon , iSun , solar energy , Duane Peterson , James Moore , Jeff Peck , Web Only , Image
Tuesday, September 7, 2021
Some employers expect to see job applications rise in response. But most expect the impact of the change to be small.
“It’s a lot more complicated than just this benefit,” Vermont Chamber of Commerce President Betsy Bishop said. She was referring to the federal programs that have paid millions to the self-employed and independent contractors since March 2020. The programs, the first-ever to provide such workers unemployment insurance benefits, ended Monday.
Tags: Employment , labor , Vermont , business , unemployment insurance , benefits , federal benefits , supplement , Web Only , Image
Monday, August 23, 2021
Das Nobel, whose company MTX Group has worked for several Vermont state agencies in the past few years, said he was drawn to the Green Mountain State because it’s close to Albany, N.Y., where he lived for many years, and it reminds him of Bangladesh, where he was born and raised until he was 15.
“The incentive is a secondary priority for us,” he said of the Vermont Employment Growth Incentive, or VEGI, which provides newly arrived companies grants if they meet targets for job creation or other investment. MTX was approved for the VEGI grant in July, though the money won’t be available until the company’s Waterbury office has met employment targets outlined as part of the grant.
Asked if he would have opened the Vermont site without the grant, Nobel said he would have, based on his desire to bring good jobs to a state that needs them.
“Absolutely,” he said Monday. “I made up my mind before.”
Tags: Das Nobel , MTX Group , contact tracing , Vermont , Waterbury , VEGI , Vermont Economic Growth Incentive , Web Only , Image
Monday, August 2, 2021
A recent surge of COVID-19 infections has placed Chittenden County under new federal recommendations that encourage vaccinated people to resume wearing masks in public indoor spaces.
But with rates of hospitalization and deaths still low in Vermont, Gov. Phil Scott has no plans to reinstate the statewide masking order that remained in place throughout last fall, winter and spring, according to spokesperson Jason Maulucci. Four people were hospitalized with the virus as of Tuesday, while two deaths were reported in July.
"If you are fully vaccinated, we believe you are substantially protected, and people shouldn't feel the need to wear [a mask] if they don't want to," Maulucci told Seven Days. "You should feel confident in the efficacy of the vaccines and safe to do things that you did prior to the pandemic."
Tags: COVID-19 , Coronavirus , mask mandates , Gov. Phil Scott , Burlington , Miro Weinberger , Web Only , Image