UP AND AT 'EM, UPPER VALLEY!
Because today looks like it'll be the nicest of the week. This morning's fog and clouds will dissipate, and then we're due a stunner: sunny, clear skies, highs getting into the low 60s. Somewhere up there where we can't see it, high pressure is cresting before it moves out and clouds move in overnight, but heck, that's for tomorrow. Today's the day I-91 southbound closes between Bradford and Fairlee. Hoo boy. As you'll remember, VTrans is doing ledgework, and both southbound lanes will be shut for 3 weeks; one of them will reopen on November 11. Hey, if you commute that way and are taking Route 5 (or opt for Route 10), shoot me an email and let us know how things look.Did you hear that low rumbling last night around 8 pm? So did plenty of other people, and they took to FB to trade speculation. Suzanne Stofflet wonders: Thunder? Jets? Apocalypse? No one knows for certain. "Oh sorry," Chris Ng posts, "I was hungry."Looks like the Randolph exit's going to get a hotel after all. As you know, there's been a fraught history of development proposals for Exit 4. But now Vermont Business Magazine's reporting that a 79-room Hilton/Hampton Inn and Conference Center has been permitted for the southeast corner of the interchange — across the highway from where developer Sam Sammis had his effort beaten back. Like Sammis, the people behind this project are locals. Hartford, Two Rivers extend their spitting match. First it was Scott Milne's proposed Exit 1 development, which the Two Rivers Ottauquechee Regional Planning Commission opposed. Now Hartford says the commission's draft regional plan "goes beyond what is required" and would harm the area around Quechee Gorge Village. The VN's John Lippman, looks at the ins and outs, and the draft plan's impact in Bradford and Norwich. Time to plant bulbs, and Henry Homeyer's got tips. They'll need sunshine (though snowdrops, crocus and some other small ones are fine in the shade of deciduous trees). You'll want deer repellant, and probably something (sharp cinders? oyster shell meal?) to keep mice, voles and squirrels away. Plus: planting techniques and some eye-catching flower pics.Wellborn fund announces $300K in ecology ed grants to area schools. The fund, named for the late Hanover naturalist Marguerite Wellborn, is administered by the NH Charitable Foundation. A bunch of local schools are getting money for outdoor classrooms, Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller landed $49,000 for teacher development, Lyme's Center for Northern Woodlands Education got funds to continue “The Outside Story"... The VN has full details.Want to dig into NH lawmakers' financial interests? Maybe you won't have to squint at illegible handwriting too much longer. New Hampshire's never been strong on accountability initiatives, and long after many other states went electronic, its financial disclosure forms for lawmakers remain on paper. But that may be about to end. NHPR reports that an electronic version of the form may be ready as soon as December.NH's next DHHS chief will have a very full plate. Last week, Health and Human Services Commissioner Jeffrey Meyers announced he's stepping down. His replacement's going to have to deal with a $25 million budget cut, Medicaid expansion, reforming child-protection services, building a new psychiatric hospital... The Monitor's Ethan DeWitt has a rundown.Don't click if you're squeamish about engorged moose ticks. Also known as winter ticks, they've been killing off moose, especially calves, whose bodies have been found with an average of 47,000 ticks aboard. Now Cheryl Sullivan, a UVM PhD student, and her advisors have discovered that Metarhizium anisopliae, a fungus that occurs naturally in the soil, kills ticks. If they can figure out dosage and how to apply it, maybe moose will have a fighting chance. OneCare Vermont is losing money, wants state to prop it up. You may never have heard of it, but it anchors the state's health-care reform efforts, a joint effort by DHMC and UVM to create savings by pooling reimbursements from Medicaid, Medicare and private insurance and focus on preventive care. But as VTDigger reports, two and a half years into its all-payer experiment, "OneCare is not able to realize enough savings to stay afloat on its own and is asking the state for support," including a $13 million Medicaid payment.What's it like living in rural Vermont? VPR and Vermont PBS are running a joint project delving into "the changing story of rural Vermont," called This Land. Castleton U prof Rich Clark surveyed 800 people about their lives, and today he and the Council on Rural Development's Paul Costello go on Vermont Edition to talk about the results. Which were supposed to be at the link by 6 am, but hadn't shown up by Daybreak pub time. Maybe soon...Most Holsteins descended from just two bulls. Round Oak Rag Apple Elevation and Pawnee Farm Arlinda Chief, to be exact. They were born in the '50s and '60s, and thanks to artificial insemination and dairy farmers' liking for bony milk cows, their genes are everywhere. But NPR's Dan Charles reports on an effort to look at the traits that have been lost, using frozen semen from what you might call "heirloom bulls." Okay, where'd we put those mittens? If you were out and about this weekend and got to somewhere with a vista, you may have noticed a dusting of snow up on some of the higher peaks. Well, on Mt. Washington it was definitely more than a dusting. Get ready! (Thanks for the tip, JF!)
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SO WHAT'S DOING TONIGHT?
She spent the '80s at the
NYT
and
Newsweek
, then turned to policy advocacy and now runs Opportunity America, a DC-based nonprofit focused on what it'll take for poor and working Americans to regain economic mobility. 4:30 in Rockefeller 1 at Dartmouth.
Farmers in the region are already facing the effects of climate change, and are responding with a range of mitigation and adaptation efforts. The network aims to bring them together to plan, commiserate, share best practices... Tonight, you can also hear UVM Extension's climate program head. It's at the Skinny Pancake in Quechee at 5 pm. If you're not a farmer but want to go, get in touch with [email protected].
Some 14 percent of all growers a century ago were African-American; the figure's at less than 2 percent now. Penniman runs Soul Fire Farm in Grafton, NY, and has just published
Farming While Black
, "the first comprehensive manual for African-heritage people ready to reclaim their rightful place of dignified agency in the food system." 7 pm in Filene Auditorium.
Edwardson is of mixed Iñupiaq/Norwegian descent, grew up in Utqiagvik, Alaska, and graduated from Dartmouth in 2012. She's an artist interested in cultural empowerment, and is now a contributing writer to
Molly
, the PBS Kids hit about a 10-year-old Alaska native. She'll be showing episodes and talking about this first nationally broadcast kids' show with a Native American lead character. 7:30 pm at the Hop's Loew Theater.
Have a fine start to the week. See you tomorrow.
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