GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Partly sunny to start, clouds building in. High pressure’s on its way, but before that happens, yesterday afternoon’s cold front is dipping farther south, and though there’s a disturbance forecast to ride along its edge, it’s likely that any rain will be to the south of us. So mostly we’re looking at highs today getting up toward 80, a mix of sun and clouds early and more clouds arriving later this morning, and then—as high pressure starts to build in overnight and skies clear, lows in the low 50s.
Checking the mail. Or maybe, as Deb Goodwin writes from Lebanon, it’s a new mail carrier?
Vital Communities to shut down town listservs tomorrow. The formal announcement came yesterday afternoon in a post to the lists: The town lists, which in one form or another have existed since 2003, will close down at 8 pm tomorrow. The events, goods, and services listservs, along with topic-specific lists, will remain. The abrupt move, says executive director Ellen Hender, comes after a decision that the lists “have outgrown what Vital Communities is able to support.” The nonprofit is urging users to sign up with Burlington-based Front Porch Forum, which has a strong presence outside the Upper Valley. The lists’ longtime volunteer moderators have been meeting to talk over other options. Lots more in a Daybreak story at the link.
With residential treatment center for moms delayed, Families Flourish Northeast looks to provide care other ways. The Enfield-based nonprofit focuses on substance use treatment for mothers and their children, and was hoping to open the doors to a residential treatment facility for 12 moms and their children on Mt. Support Road in Lebanon later this year. However, reports Clare Shanahan in the VN, “challenges including delays in federal funding have pushed the opening to sometime in 2027.” So the group is teaming up with DH and TLC Family Resource Center to connect moms and pregnant women to services. In 2024, Shanahan notes, 15 percent of babies born in Sullivan County had been exposed to cannabis, opioids, or other substances.
SPONSORED: Upper Valley Music Center invites you to a contra dance for a great cause! Join the fun and support access to music education this Saturday, Aug. 22 at Tracy Hall in Norwich, with an all-star line up of callers including David Millstone, Nils Fredland, Kevin Donohue, and Erin Smith, and musicians Amy Englesberg, Annie McDougall, and Rose Powell. All are welcome, total beginners and avid dancers alike! Admission is by donation, and all proceeds will benefit tuition assistance to expand access to music making. Sponsored by Upper Valley Music Center.
Where are the best spots in the Upper Valley to see Mt. Washington? “I can just see the summit from I-89 as I come down the rise from the Grantham rest area (but not actually FROM the rest area),” writes Stephanie Seacord. She’s got more than a passing interest in this, because she’s doing PR for the Honor Summit—the effort organized for Sept. 9-12, the days around the 25th anniversary of 9/11, to honor veterans, firefighters and first responders (both those who lost their lives that day and those affected by it) by sending two LED light beams from the top of Mt. Washington three miles into the sky. Stephanie’s collecting possible Upper Valley viewing spots, in part to encourage viewing parties. Email her at [email protected]. She’ll share results.
SPONSORED: Do you have ideas about how to improve the patient and family experience at APD?Join our Patient and Family Advisory Council (PFAC). We're looking for patients and their family members to share their experiences, provide feedback, and collaborate with APD providers, staff, department leaders, and fellow council members to help strengthen patient and family-centered care. Participants can attend meetings in person or remotely based on their availability. To learn more, email [email protected]. Sponsored by Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital.
Town turnover and compliance issues tangle Killington’s effort to ease way for massive resort project. The $3 billion effort to remake Killington Resort, writes Ian Curry in Seven Days, depends on a $110 million investment in new roads and sewer systems by the town of Killington. And that, in turn, depends on tax-increment financing, or borrowing the money against the development’s future tax revenues. But the state says it’s found “numerous errors and areas of concern” in the town’s paperwork—and staff turnover “has left the town’s books in disarray and complicated efforts to run the TIF properly.” Moreover, the town manager’s been put on leave and the finance director quit in June. Curry digs into it all.
NH legislature overrides vetoes on a variety of issues, including state’s transportation plan. Gov. Kelly Ayotte had vetoed the 10-year transportation bill over a provision hiking highway tolls on out-of-state visitors. Yesterday, a bipartisan two-thirds majority overrode the veto, allowing not just the toll hike for non-Granite Staters to go forward, but several major highway projects, including widening I-93 around Concord. As NH Bulletin’s Ethan DeWitt and William Skipworth write, lawmakers overrode another six of Ayotte’s 31 total vetoes, including measures related to retrial provisions for convicted felons and fees for out-of-state users of NH state parks.
Underwater, from the air, on the coast or out at sea. Finalists in the Ocean Photographer of the Year competition are out, chosen from thousands of images. The Atlantic (appropriately) has highlights, including Daniela Tommasi’s aerial view of tiny surfers at the edge of a Venetian-lace sea in Australia and Qingsheng Sun’s “vast floating community” of fish-farming cages and wooden huts interlocked in a colorful puzzle. Oceanographic has the complete portfolio of finalists—breaking waves off Tahiti, saffron-hued Christmas tree worms, newborn cardinalfish peeking safely from the shelter of their parent’s mouth. Winners will be announced in September.
The Thursday Crossword. Puzzle virtuoso Laura Braunstein’s “midi”—not too long, not too short, just…
Today's Wordbreak. With a word from yesterday’s Daybreak.
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HEADS UP
In Hanover, “Read Me Again Ishmael: Another Moby-Dick-athon.” The event, a chapter by chapter read-aloud of “Herman Melville’s very long, very strange novel of monomania, monstrosity, manly handholding, and nautical info dumping” will take place over two days, and you’re welcome to sign up to read or just go listen. 9 am to 9 pm today at Dartmouth’s Literary Arts Bridge, 9 am to 8 pm tomorrow at Still North Books & Bar. There are still reading slots open, and you can sign up here.
Feel like drawing late-summer flowers? The Upper Valley Nature Journaling Group is going to meet at 5:30 this afternoon at the Baker’s Crossing Conservation Area in Lebanon: bring a journal and pencil or colored pencils, pen, or watercolors. No charge, all welcome. Email [email protected] with questions. No link.
High Drive at Feast & Field. Beth Telford, Justin Park, and Eli Mansur pull into Fable Farm in Barnard with “sets of toe-tapping dance tunes from the Celtic traditions, as well as songs from various sources that speak to them.” Gates and food at 5:30 pm, music starts up around 6.
The Collective Soul concert at the Lake Morey Resort has been canceled. The resort says it’s “due to circumstances outside our control” and that the show won’t be rescheduled.
And for today...
Earlier this year, at the Fort Worth African American Roots Music Festival, the folks from Wyoming-based Western AF write, “One performance stopped us in our tracks.” It was Sable Sisters, a trio of roots music/Americana artists: Montreal’s Kaia Kater on banjo, Fort Worth’s Brandi Waller-Pace on bass, and New Orleans fiddler Shanice Richards. “Together, the three have a remarkable musical chemistry. Their voices weave effortlessly around one another, each bringing a distinct perspective while creating something that feels timeless.” Here they are with Gillian Welch’s “Scarlet Town.”
See you tomorrow.
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