GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
A warm, quiet day. We've got high pressure with us for much of the day, along with mostly sunny skies and temps reaching the low 40s. Calm winds today from the southeast. There's a weak system coming through tonight that could produce a little bit of snow, probably less than an inch—though higher elevations in the mountains could see a few inches. High 20s overnight.West Leb Feed & Supply sold. To its workers—eventually. Longtime owners Curt and Sharon Jacques are handing the landmark West Lebanon business off to a company called Teamshares, reports John Lippman in the Valley News; it will give employees a 10 percent share and then, over time, build their stake to 80 percent. That could take as long as two decades, Lippman writes. “Our goal," Curt Jacques tells him, "was to find a partner that we could embrace that would continue this legacy and make this something that our employees could be proud of.” With a quick tutorial on WLF&S's history and Teamshares' model.So, what would you do with a $756,000 windfall? Actually, just replace that amount with whatever large sum of money your town is due under the American Rescue Plan. As Li Shen writes in Sidenote, the money does comes with some strings attached, most notably that the funds will have to be spent by the end of 2026 or they'll go back to the US Treasury. Li details what the money can and cannot be spent on, and lays out what Thetford residents told a Selectboard survey they'd like it to go toward: new affordable housing, improved water and sewer, road and bridge improvements...Valley News reviving its volunteer jobs list. Pre-pandemic, the newspaper kept a running online list of nonprofit organizations and their volunteer needs, which it also published in the print edition once a week. That all ended as lockdowns began and uncertainty reigned. Now, however, many organizations around the region are "trying to build back their volunteer base in the wake of the pandemic," writes Liz Sauchelli, so the list—filled with volunteer opportunities—is back. (Note: The link to the list in her article takes you to a dead end. Use this one instead.)Springfield VT, Norwich, Killington look to expand police departments. VTDigger's Ethan Weinstein takes a look at the three towns' efforts to respond to staffing shortages and fears of crime by beefing up. Springfield, which has been dealing with gun violence and drug issues with a significantly depleted police force, hopes to build from 11 to 13 patrol officers this year and 15 officers next year. Killington's police chief is asking voters for a 44 percent budget increase; its population doubled between 2010 and 2020, and skiers are back in force. In Norwich, a group of citizens is pushing for five full-time officers.Corinth's Pike Hill Mine to get Superfund cleanup money. It's on the new list of 22 Superfund "second wave" sites to get funding from the 2021 Infrastructure Act, which was released by the federal EPA on Friday, reports Alex Nuti-de Biasi in today's Journal Opinion newsletter. The Ely Mine in Vershire was among the first wave of sites. Here's the EPA's background on the Pike Hill Mine and its background page for the Ely Copper Mine."Change happens from the fringe." John Killacky is the former director of Burlington's Flynn Theater, a former VT state legislator, and, right at the moment, the artist behind a new video installation at JAM in WRJ. He talked to Vermont Public's Mitch Wertlieb about his videos "Flux" and "Elegies," which along with "Flow" run through the end of the month at JAM. "Flux" uses objects he found, including a table from a wedding he officiated at and a stringless, cracked violin lent by a former statehouse colleague—in all, 12 "everyday objects that happened in my life."Court documents: Man accused of Reid murders was subject of Concord police calls in months leading up to homicide. The Monitor's Jamie L. Costa reports that the documents, released after Logan Clegg's arraignment last month, detail "the uneasy and wary presence felt by passersby in the wake of their encounters with Clegg." Several people were so unnerved by Clegg's yelling and threatening presence around the popular Marsh Loop Trail that they alerted police—who were unable to locate the man they were reporting.Legalized gambling in NH: "It is just accepted, that is what people want. It is not worth the fight to stop it any more.” That's Hanover's Jim Rubens, talking to NHPR's Todd Bookman. The former state senator led the opposition to casinos in the state, and as Bookman reports, he won the battles "but still seemingly lost the war." That's because even if "casinos" aren't legal, there are now 14 "charitable gaming facilities" across the state that sure act like casinos, "complete with craps games, complicated carpet patterns and rows of slot machines." They have to give 35 percent of revenues to nonprofits, but still.Okay, so "wild skating" around here is a bust this year. But there's always Canada. Or, heck, Iceland. In the Wall St. Journal (gift link, no paywall), Sarah Karnasiewicz writes about the draw of skating on rivers and lakes, nordic skaters' search for ice that “feels like silk beneath your blades, smoother even than Zamboni ice,” and talks to Jamie Hess, the Upper Valley local who pretty much created the sport in this country. She profiles five spots you can head instead of the backcountry, including Lake Morey and Ottawa's Rideau Canal. (Thanks, LM!)Flaco on the run. Flaco's a Eurasian eagle-owl who, 11 days ago, got out of his enclosure at the Central Park Zoo after someone cut a hole in the mesh. He's been on the lam ever since—only, as Margaret Osborne writes for Smithsonian, in highly public fashion. He's drawn crowds of admirers—Eurasian eagle-owls have a wingspan of five to six feet and are among the largest owls out there—and hasn't been shy about hanging out around Central Park, all the while avoiding nets and traps set out by police and zookeepers worried about his safety.The Monday Vordle. With a word from Friday's Daybreak.
Heads Up
Today at 5:30, Dartmouth's Rockefeller Center hosts campaign strategist Andy Meyer, who lives in Hanover and, among other things, ran Georgia US Sen. Raphael Warnock's digital advertising program in his successful 2020 and 2022 campaigns. Meyer will be talking with Rocky's Charles Wheelan about how candidates craft their messages, what goes into the making of modern political ads—and how to build a career as a political consultant. In-person in Rockefeller Hall and livestreamed.
And let's start the week with...Well-known current events commentator Ella Fitzgerald and "Two Little Men in a Flying Saucer." From 1951.See you tomorrow.
Written and published by Rob Gurwitt Writer/editor: Jonea Gurwitt Poetry editor: Michael Lipson About Rob About Michael
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