Archive - Nov 2010
November 24th
There are plenty of reasons to see through the glass darkly in late November. You don’t need me to remind you what they are.
But there are also good reasons why it’s become an American tradition to say thanks amid the gathering darkness.
On this holiday, I’m grateful for a few small-time heroes.
I call them “small-time” not because their heroism is petty or unworthy. It’s just that their kind of everyday valor goes largely unnoticed.
I got to thinking about that when I attended a wedding at the Waybury Inn this past summer.
Boards at the four Addison Northwest Supervisory Union schools are all making efforts to meet the Challenges for Change spending recommendations. Here’s what’s going on at each school:
VUHS ISSUES
Vergennes Union High School Co-Principal Ed Webbley said VUHS must cut about $165,000 from the previous budget plus new costs to reach level funding. That goal could be reached because fewer aides will be needed next year and another “position or two” will be lost through attrition, he said.
“It would cost us quite a bit, but we would still have full programs,” he said.
I hadn’t meant to wait so long to read “Tales from the Nam.”
“Tales from the Nam” is a first-hand look at the life of a “grunt” in the Vietnam War. It’s comprehensive and compelling, authentic, well researched, well remembered, and well recounted.
It was written by Dave Nicholson, my friend and basketball teammate from long ago at Middlebury (“Nick” to all who knew him then), and published in 2008.
November 22nd
MIDDLEBURY — “Challenges for Change” has largely been portrayed as an effort by the Douglas administration and the 2010 Legislature to save $38 million in state spending by making government programs more lean and efficient.
And while the new directive has sent many public entities scrambling to make deep cuts, a few enterprising nonprofits are poised to receive some budget increases for some innovative programs that could help the state save more money in the long run to meet the Challenges goal.
MIDDLEBURY — The turkeys are flying off the shelves at Helping Overcome Poverty’s Effects (HOPE’s) headquarters on Boardman Street, leaving officials concerned about being able to meet the demand of needy families this Thanksgiving and Christmas.
As of last Wednesday, 223 Addison County households had signed up for a turkey and related side dishes from the local poverty-fighting agency. HOPE has thus far ordered a total of 325 birds to cover special meals for qualifying families on Thanksgiving and Christmas.
VERGENNES — The five Addison Northwest Supervisory Union towns are headed toward another vote on one-board governance, almost certainly on Town Meeting Day this coming March.
Last Wednesday, the full ANwSU board met at Vergennes Union High School with the board subcommittee that this fall has been studying unification. The board then made a formal motion to approve what will be the fifth unification vote in six years.
BRISTOL — Representatives of Mount Abraham Union High School teachers and school board members came to the contract negotiations table last Thursday night following a quiet picket carried out by the teachers’ organization. The two sides left the meeting with only the promise of another meeting.
