GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
There's actually going to be some sun today. Mostly cloudy first thing, but then dry air will move in from the west, the clouds will scatter, and by this afternoon it'll be blue skies. Temps up into the low 30s, though there'll also be some wind from the northwest, so it's not a day for t-shirts yet. Down into the low teens tonight.There's no better time for skiing than the middle of a snowstorm. Why? Because it's so dang photogenic. Quechee's Lisa Lacasse was out with her camera all day on Tuesday, and among other things caught this scene on the Quechee golf course, which looks about as typically Vermont as you could ask. Also out... a moose wandering Norwich. It's been lighting up neighborhood email lists the last few days, and yesterday Demo Sofronas ran a pic of it in his About Norwich newsletter ambling down Hazen Street, looking for all the world like it wanted to drop by the police station. With Rte. 120 study, NHDOT looks to solve highway-exit congestion. Remember last week's link to the DOT's survey? Tim Camerato has the story behind the effort in the Valley News. It's aimed at alleviating the backup onto I-89 in the morning and rush-hour congestion on 120. Lots of commenters—and local officials—want the DOT to look at bike and pedestrian improvements rather than more pavement. “In the transportation world, we know when we build more road lanes that cars will fill them up again and we’ll still have a traffic problem,” says the regional planning commission's Meghan Butts."Some of these new variants can reinfect people who are already infected and have recovered." That's one of the striking bits of news in an interview by The Dartmouth's Charlie Palsho with Dr. Daniel Lucey, an infectious disease specialist at Georgetown and a Dartmouth grad. They talk over the variants (there's evidence the UK one is both more contagious and more deadly), how vaccines should handle them, and how the Upper Valley should prepare. He also praises the Dartmouth Covid team's work so far as "a model of success for other colleges and surrounding communities."Bradford writer Alexander Chee lands $50K fellowship to go do what he wants. The unrestricted grant was one of 60 announced yesterday by Chicago-based United States Artists, which for the last 15 years has supported writers, actors, musicians, dancers, and other artists as they pursue their creative work. Chee, who also teaches English at Dartmouth, tells Seven Days' Margot Harrison that he plans to put the money to use funding travel and research for his next project, involving his father's native Korea.SPONSORED: On top of everything else, 2020 was another bad year for our climate. It tied 2016 as the warmest year on record. The US had 22 weather-related events topping $1 billion in damage. And in northern New England, we produced more climate pollution per person than anywhere else in the Northeast. In 2021, you can help change the forecast by switching to backyard solar, electric vehicles, and energy-saving heat pumps. Check out your options at Solaflect Energy and maximize your savings. The power is in our hands to make a difference! Sponsored by Solaflect Energy.Mascoma Lake skating organizers thinking big. WCAX's Adam Sullivan has a quick profile of the effort by Joan Holcombe, Mary Reynolds, and the Nordic Skater's Ben Prime to turn the lake into a winter skating destination. It's fun to watch. But at the end, Sullivan notes that they're "working on developing a model that can be replicated on lake and ponds across the country." Says Prime, "All the way from setup to equipment that is required to how much time goes into it."
On second try, Ryan Terrell makes it to NH Board of Education. Terrell, who works for a hair salon distribution company, was first nominated by Gov. Chris Sununu last year but blocked by Democrats on the Executive Council as lacking education experience. Then-councillor Andru Volinsky also criticized Sununu for engaging in "tokenism" by nominating Terrell, who is Black; he later apologized. With a new Republican majority on the council, Sununu renominated Terrell, who was named to the board on a 4-1 party-line vote.NH gives up on federal vaccine scheduling system, designs its own. The state has been taking it in the chin as frustrated residents try—and often fail—to schedule second vaccine doses using a website built by Deloitte for the CDC. NH was one of only nine states to opt in to using it, despite early reviews that it was problematic. Yesterday, reports the AP's Holly Ramer, Gov. Chris Sununu told the Executive Council the state will roll out its own in time for the next phase. “I think everyone agrees this federal system is a real problem. It is clunky, it is messy. We can’t really control it," he said. Skier at Ammonoosuc Ravine killed in avalanche. The experienced backcountry skier was reported missing Tuesday night; after a daylong search, his body was found last night under 13 feet of snow and debris by rescue teams thanks to an avalanche beacon he carried, NH Fish & Game announced. They added that though he was prepared with the right equipment, skiing in avalanche conditions is always dangerous. "Without the transceiver, it is possible the skier’s body...would not have been located until the snow completely melted in the spring."Everyone Eats now hoping to last through June. The unusual Vermont effort that ties together farmers, restaurants, and people in financial straits who need food resumed last month after a pause, but with only enough funding to last three weeks. Now, reports the Rutland Herald's Patrick McCardle, SEVCA's Jean Hamilton, the statewide coordinator for the program, says funding is in the pipeline...as long as FEMA will reimburse the state, which in turn depends on the official pandemic state of emergency being in place.VT, OneCare face off over payroll info. Yes, OneCare is basically the spearhead for Vermont's health-care reform effort, managing the state's all-payer system. But state auditor Doug Hoffer, who last year began releasing a set of audit reports questioning its cost-effectiveness, has been stymied in his attempts to get payroll data. So yesterday, the attorney general's office sued on his behalf. OneCare called the suit "baseless overreach." “We don’t understand why the Auditor believes he is entitled to the personal financial information of each and every one of our employees," said its CEO in a press release.Governor, legislature look into VT data breach. Gov. Phil Scott yesterday appointed a new deputy commissioner and asked Hoffer to audit the state labor department as fallout continued from the revelation that it sent tax forms with personal information, including social security numbers, to the wrong recipients. Legislators will meet today with Hoffer and the governor's staff to discuss an investigation. VTDigger's Anne Wallace Allen also reports that the scale of the breach may be smaller than initially thought, affecting 25,000 to 44,800 people."To be a falconer is to see like a bird." In Sierra magazine, Amanda Giracca profiles Hartland's Zooey Zullo: UVAC customer service manager, former principal and teacher-education director... and third-year falconer. Actually, "profiles" isn't quite right. It's as much about Zullo and her red-tailed hawk, Addison—in a sense, Giracca writes, falconers "borrow" their bird from the wild for a season or two—as it is a meditation on falconry and on why Giracca herself is so drawn to spending time with the people who practice it.Armadillos, black vultures, anhingas, herons, sandhill cranes, some crazy-beautiful sunsets, and one mean-looking alligator. Ordinarily, Lebanon photographer Travis Paige plies his art around the Upper Valley. But he had family reasons to be in Florida recently and spent time in the Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge, where he'd spent time in years past taking photos with his dad. He collects those photos in a blog post—with a lot of wildlife we don't get to see around here.
Dartmouth reports 8 active cases among students (no change) and 6 among faculty and staff (up 1). In the meantime, 10 students and 10 faculty/staff are in quarantine because of travel or exposure, while 9 students and 21 faculty/staff are in isolation awaiting results or because they tested positive.
NH reported 354 new cases yesterday for a cumulative total of 66,721. There were 10 new deaths, for a total of 1,076. Meanwhile, 207 people are hospitalized (up 5). The current active caseload stands at 4,081 (down 141). The state reports 194 active cases in Grafton County (down 14 over the past two days), 145 in Sullivan (down 33), and 364 in Merrimack (down 25). In town-by-town numbers, the state says Claremont has 69 active cases (down 10 since Tuesday), Unity has 20 (down 15), Newport has 19 (down 7), Hanover has 13 (down 1), Charlestown has 10 (no change), Sunapee has 8 (no change), Rumney has 8 (up 3), Lebanon has 6 (down 6), Plainfield has 6 (up 1), New London has 6 (down 2), and Enfield has 5 (down 4). Haverhill, Warren, Wentworth, Dorchester, Canaan, Grantham, Cornish, Croydon, Springfield, Wilmot, and Newbury all have 1-4. Grafton's off the list.
VT reported 129 new cases yesterday, bringing it to a total case count of 12,329. There were 3 new deaths, which now number 179 all told, while 52 people with confirmed cases are hospitalized (down 2). Windsor County gained 6 new cases to stand at 874 for the pandemic (with 114 over the past 14 days). Orange County had 3 new cases and is now at 432 cumulatively (with 36 cases over the past 14 days).
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At 6 pm, the Dartmouth Political Union is bringing together five professional athletes to talk about kneeling during the national anthem, the ability of sports to bring Americans together, and the line between politics and sports in general. The event features current and former NFL players Prince Amukamara, Shawn Poindexter, and Trevin Wade, and professional soccer players Domi Richardson and Imani Dorsey.
At 6:30 this evening, the Norwich Historical Society launches an intriguing series of presentations with a twist: The registration fee goes either to a Norwich restaurant (more on that in a minute) or to the Haven's food pantry. Tonight's program features Montshire educator Rebecca Haynes talking about porcupines and how they've adapted to life in the woods around us. The idea is that you can also order a meal to eat while you watch, but those orders need to be in by Tuesday, so you can do that for future events; for tonight, just make a donation.
This evening at 7, the Norwich Bookstore hosts Charles Wheelan, the Dartmouth lecturer and former journalist whose new book, We Came, We Saw, We Left: A Family Gap Year, has been drawing national attention (NPR, NYT, LA Times...). The book's a memoir of a nine-month trip around the world the family took in 2016, a "dizzying blend of tension, charm, silliness, headlong risk and occasionally transcendent profundity," as the LAT put it. All while answering questions like, How do you sneak out of a Peruvian town that has been barricaded by the local army? And where can you get treatment for a flesh-eating bacteria your daughter picked up two continents ago?
Starting today, Billings Farm's film series continues with The Fight, the 2020 documentary about about a team of ACLU lawyers taking on the federal government over the last few years on the separation of immigrants from their children, reproductive rights, the proposed citizenship question on the census, and LGBT rights. "The movie is concerned not with simple boosterism but with showing the inner workings of building a case: how potential clients are identified, what arguments get made, how lawyers prepare for court appearances and how arcane matters of law affect real lives," wrote the NYT when it came out. Thru Sunday, $12.
And the Hop's Film on Demand series launches two new films, running through Feb. 10. Our Time Machine is a 2019 documentary about Shanghai artist Maleonn, who races to create an autobiographical play using life-sized puppets for his father—former artistic director of the Shanghai Chinese Opera Theater—before he succumbs to dementia. The film is about family, memory, the legacy of the Cultural Revolution...but also about Maleonn's wondrous puppets. Then there's The Black Book of Father Dinis, a joint Portuguese/French production by a Chilean director about a young peasant maid and her even younger charge amid the tumult of late-18th century Europe.
Musician, bandleader, actor, composer, and all-around performer Jon Batiste has a new album coming out next month. A few weeks ago he released a single from it, "I Need You." “This song is a vibe cleanse," he said at the time. "After 2020, this is like a warm hug. Let’s bring the vibes back!” And oh yes:
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