By Anne Galloway/VTDigger The secretary of the Agency of Human Services has balked at a request from the Brattleboro Retreat for additional monies to make up for a “reoccurring financial crisis.” In response to the state’s refusal to give the Retreat an additional $2 million in funding, the board of trustees alerted the state it…

By Grace Elletson/VTDigger A group of lawmakers has introduced a bill for the 2020 session that would decriminalize sex work in the state of Vermont. The bill, only four pages long, would simply repeal current sex work statutes prohibiting the act. Human trafficking and the sale of sex that is coerced in any form would still…

Anne Galloway /VTDigger.org WATERBURY — A Middlesex CBD processor was arrested Wednesday, Dec. 18 for allegedly failing to pay local hemp farmers $137,500 for hemp harvested this past summer and fall, according to Vermont State Police. Douglas Bell, owner of CBD-Vermont in Waterbury, allegedly victimized five Vermont farms in Washington and Lamoille counties — Ananda…

By Jacob Dawson/VTDigger A state law allowing people with terminal illnesses to end their lives with the aid of a physician was used by 28 Vermonters during a recent two-year period, according to a recent state Health Department report. In 2013, then-Gov. Peter Shumlin signed into law Act 39, which allows patients with conditions like cancer, ALS and…

An off-duty Vermont State Police trooper was arrested for DUI in Rutland Jan. 6. Officer Misty Klementowski of the Rutland City Police Department arrested Craig Roland for DUI on Deer Street in Rutland City around 6 a.m. A roadside breathalyzer was administered with a resulting BAC of .189 — more than twice the legal limit…

By John McCright Cows ran loose through Middlebury around noon on New Year’s Eve when the gate on the back of a truck transporting them swung open as it went through downtown. The cows wandered up Main Street from the post office and down Seymour Street where they meandered through yards and parking lots until…

Rutland Regional Medical Center welcomed its first baby born in 2020. A girl, McKinley Ann Jordan, was born at 7:07 a.m. on Jan. 2, weighing 5 pounds 7.4 ounces to parents Cheyenne Ford and Jonathan Jordan of Rutland.

The future of The Prosper Valley School in Pomfret is still undecided after more than 18 months and $100,000 in remediation work by the Windsor Central consolidated school district. A decision will be discussed at the WCUSD’s Jan. 13 board meeting in the Teagle Library in Woodstock. TPVS was closed when toxic mold and moisture…

By Curt Peterson Windsor Central Modified Unified Union School District (WCUSD) finance committee members are struggling with their fiscal year 2021 primary goal of avoiding a “penalty situation” for per-student overspending. The state set the per equalized pupil spending cap at $18,756. The final district budget will be divided by the number of equalized, non-tuitioned…

Staff report Killington Mountain School students joined athletes from the U.S. Men’s Alpine Ski Team to train on Highline Friday, Jan. 3. The athletes were in town to ski on eastern snow in preparation for a NorAm race at Burke Mountain. “They wanted to come down here because of the terrain and the steepness of…

By Katy Savage Two Pittsfield Select Board members are trying to oust the third board member. Select Board chair Charles Piso and board member Matt Corron took a vote of no confidence in Select Board member Ann Keundig at a special meeting Thursday, Jan. 2, and requested her to resign immediately. “Ann’s conduct has been…

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Along with hitting the gym more often and starting a diet, quitting smoking tops many New Year’s resolution lists. There are currently 67,400 smokers in Vermont and 57% of them tried to quit last year. New ads from e-cigarette companies would have those smokers falsely believe that switching to vaping is quitting smoking. The American…

By Alan J. Keays/VTDigger A group of state officials are recommending a change in policy that allows prisoners to get out from behind bars earlier apply to inmates who were sentenced before the new law took effect. However, whether that recommendation makes it past a legislative rules committee remains unclear. A bill passed and signed into…

By Mary Ellen Shaw Most of you reading this probably did not go to college in the 1960s. And if you did you were probably not at an all-girls Catholic college. It would probably seem like being in the convent if you could relive that experience today. I spent four years at Trinity College in…