Archive - Apr 2010
April 12th
VERGENNES — Vergennes and Addison residents will decide on Tuesday, May 11, whether to change their minds on supporting unification of the Addison Northwest Supervisory Union under one-board governance.
Both towns joined Ferrisburgh, Panton and Waltham in voting by wide margins on March 2 to back the switch, but Vergennes and Addison petitioners successfully requested second votes.
BRISTOL — Residents and passersby in Bristol can expect some delays heading through downtown this spring and summer as construction ramps up on a $1.38 million project to replace a section of the town’s aging stormwater system and upgrade the downtown water main.
MIDDLEBURY — In a Saturday game between the two boys’ lacrosse programs that between them won every state championship between 1993 and 2003, visiting Woodstock posted what has been a rare win in recent years over Middlebury, 8-2, at Middlebury College’s Alumni Stadium.
Play bore little resemblance to some of the duels of a decade ago between the Tigers and Wasps — balls hit the ground or rolled out of bounds far more often than planned as turnovers plagued both teams.
VERGENNES — Of the three people who learned that a video on the Vergennes After School bicycle maintenance class had won a statewide award on March 25, Robert Burbo betrayed the least emotion — which was strange, considering that he had made the video.
But this is how the soft-spoken Vergennes Union High School sophomore approaches most things, whether it is helping to set up a computer network for the middle school or deciding where to make a cut on a video he has filmed. Learning that he had won $1,000 and six Flip video cameras for the afterschool program was no different.
Social Security starts its downward slide this year. Because of the recession and 10 percent unemployment, payroll tax receipts will fall below pensions paid out for the first time.
Today’s retirees need not worry. The imbalance will not affect the program until 2037, or thereabouts. Because income has exceeded expenses for decades, the Social Security trust fund has a balance of about $2.5 trillion invested in Treasury bills. The interest on those notes added to payroll tax receipts will keep pension checks flowing for a few years.
April 8th
5. All you need is love
Editor’s note: This is the fifth in a series of essays about politics and the moral life. The essays develop themes from a work by the philosopher Plato, entitled “Laws,” which he wrote shortly before his death in 347 BCE. “Laws” is written as a dialogue involving three old men with long experience in politics: Cleinias, from the Cretan city of Cnossos; Megillus, from Sparta; and an Athenian stranger who is not named, but who may be Plato himself. This essay follows Plato’s digression into the “Symposium.”
SHOREHAM — Newton Academy, the state’s oldest standing secondary school building and the focus of a major renovation effort by the town of Shoreham, was destroyed by a fire early Wednesday morning.
Local firefighters believe a lightening strike triggered the blaze, which quickly consumed the town-owned building that hosted a pre-school and medical clinic.
ADDISON COUNTY — Vermont dairy farmers slogged through the worst milk prices they’d seen in decades for much of 2009, struggling to stay in business as they sold their milk at prices so low they could not cover the cost of production.
Now, milk price forecasts suggest that 2010 isn’t shaping up to be much better for dairymen, many of whom went into debt to the tune of $800 to $1,000 per cow last year in order to continue farming.
