GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Snow. Not a big storm, but not just a dusting, either. The system’s moving in from the southwest and moving northeast, and there’s a chance snow will reach us by mid or late morning, certainly by early afternoon. Once it does, it’ll last into tonight and possibly overnight, with totals somewhere in the 2”-4” range (the mountains may get more). Highs today near 30, lows in the mid 20s. Here’s the deal for VT, and for NH.
Just a reminder: Tomorrow’s Daybreak will be the last of the year. After that, back again on Monday, Jan. 5.
Hartland woman struck, killed by driver in Woodstock. Janet Spencer, 62, was hit Sunday evening as she was trying to cross Route 106 in Woodstock, the town’s police department said in a press release. State and local investigators determined that a 2010 Subaru Forester driven by a 38-year-old Windsor man and traveling south hit her not long after 5 pm. “No charges have been announced,” the Valley News report.
“It felt every other person that was coming through shaking hands was, ‘I’m a classmate … ‘I was a classmate’ … ‘I was a classmate.’” That was in the receiving line at Rhonda Littlefield’s memorial service at Knight Funeral Home after her death from pancreatic cancer in September. And that heavy turnout from Hartford High’s Class of 1978 came because Littlefield was an organizing whirlwind, writes the VN’s John Lippman in his “A Life” piece: keeping classmates in touch, building the yearly parade float, launching fundraisers. Littlefield was fearless and tough as nails—in her work at Lebanon Crushed Stone, in her personal life, and at the very end. Lippman sketches what made her so memorable.
Jingle Bell Stock. We’re talking rolling stock, and in particular the Amtrak Vermonters that come through WRJ tooting out the rhythm of “Jingle Bells”. Tad Montgomery got curious and asked about it on the Hartford listserv (at the burgundy link), which brought an email from someone informing him that they do it every year. But heck, we can’t leave it there. Here’s what Amtrak’s Jason Abrams tells us: “This has been a tradition for many years since as far back as at least the 1970s. They also play ‘Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer’, ‘Shave and a Haircut’, and ‘Silent Night’.” Time to head down to the WRJ tracks around 11:37 am or 6:18 pm for a listen.
SPONSORED: Finishing touches, found at Chapman’s. For generations, families have stopped at Chapman’s General during Christmas week for those last little treasures that make the holiday special. From sweets to homey gifts, toys, and winter comforts, we’re here to help you wrap up the season with heart. Thank you for supporting 150 years of local tradition in Fairlee. Sponsored by Chapman’s General — Your hometown country store since 1874.
NH AG clears Karen Liot Hill on emails in legal challenge to state voting law. It’s been a while, but you may recall that GOP state lawmakers have charged that the lone Democrat on the Executive Council engaged in illegal electioneering when she sought help finding potential plaintiffs against a law tightening voting access. Now, reports Amanda Gokee in the Globe (sorry, paywall), the Election Law Unit says it’s reviewed five of Liot Hill’s emails and concluded they don’t meet the definition of “electioneering” and that there was no evidence Liot Hill had misused her position.
In NH, towns talk a good game on housing, but actual progress is slow. The state needs an additional 25,000 units to have what would be considered a “healthy” housing market. And while some towns and state lawmakers are trying to spur construction with changes to zoning laws, progress is “halting,” writes NH Bulletin’s Ethan Dewitt in a roundup on the state of play. Minimum parking requirements and minimum lot sizes often get in the way of more affordable housing forms like accessory dwelling units or manufactured homes. Still, Manchester did just overhaul its zoning code, and “liberalizing” zoning changes across the state do outnumber new restrictions.
Veterans’ housing? Hotel? Remember how Easterseals NH won a $23 million contract with the state to build a campus for veterans in Franklin? It was supposed to include 31 permanent housing units and 30 short-term “respite/retreat beds” for veterans. Now, reports NHPR’s Annmarie Timmins, while veterans have moved into the permanent units, the short-term beds seem not to exist. Instead, there’s a conference center and 22 “hotel rooms” that cannot be rented by individual veterans. Former employees say veteran care is no longer at the heart of the project. Easterseals says it’s a matter of messaging and that it’s using the conference center to raise funds for veterans' assistance. Timmins lays out the shifting marketing and the controversy.
Effort to remove Boscawen statue gets surprising pushback. The statue commemorates Hannah Duston, who killed and scalped 10 Native Americans in 1697, and is the target of a bill filed by GOP Rep. David Nagel this fall to remove it. But, reports NHPR’s Julia Furukawa, his effort aroused serious blowback, including from the Abenaki First Nation at Odanak, in Quebec. “Don't erase,” Daniel Nolett, the general director of the Odanak council, tells Furukawa. “Otherwise you're erasing part of the history, and that was an important fact of what happened in that little town back then.” Nagel now says the statue should remain, but with Indigenous perspective, too.
Skier rescued from Stowe Toll Road vows to name first-born daughter after rescuer. In a post yesterday, Stowe Mountain Rescue wrote that the skier had “endeared himself to us” by admitting that he’d followed tracks late in the day and entered the sidecountry “unequipped”; been “calm and coachable…in those cold, dark woods,” downloading a compass app and following instructions on how to take a bearing so he could head toward where they could intercept him; and making that naming promise. “No guarantee that he’ll follow through with it, but it’s a measure of his gratitude,” they write. They add advice on compasses and apps—and battery packs.
VT’s BlueCross BlueShield launches marketing campaign taking aim at UVM and DHMC. As Olivia Gieger reports in VTDigger, the state’s largest insurance company has launched a price-comparison website aimed partly at encouraging policyholders to seek lower-cost procedures, and partly to bring attention to the hospital costs that help drive the state’s sky-high health care costs. At its newly launched website (“Vermont Affordable Care”) it cites an MRI cost of $6,520 at UVM Med Center, $4,884 at DH, $2,785 at Northwestern Medical Center, and $1,779 at “independent facilities” like VT Diagnostic Imaging in Williston.
Rutland County prosecutor accuses Rutland police chief, commander of suppressing internal affairs report. Yesterday’s move came two days after the city’s police commission announced Police Chief Brian Kilcullen would be retiring early, reports VTDigger’s Alan J. Keays. The report looked into the death of Rutland police trainee Jessica Ebbighausen during a high-speed 2023 chase in the city. The report contends that mistakes by more senior officers “left Ebbighausen — and the public at large — needlessly exposed to the collateral danger of an unwarranted high-speed pursuit,” wrote Seven Days’ Derek Brouwer and Colin Flanders recently. Kilcullen notified neither the prosecutor nor the commission about the report.
Out of a trove of old glass bottles in WRJ, a history of Vermont’s 1800s DIY medicine craze. You’ve met Kelby Greene before: She’s got a JAM podcast series called Roadside Vermont. She also babysits for John Haffner’s family in WRJ, and he got to telling her about all these old glass bottles he’d dug up. As it happens, Kelby had been working on a story about the state’s patent medicine mania. So on VT Public’s Brave Little State, she digs into the story behind “N.K. Brown’s Teething Cordial” and “Dr. Ingram’s Nervine Pain Extractor” and, especially, “D.W. Bancroft’s Liniment or Instant Relief.” And his liver syrup. And lung syrup. And Worm Elixir. And, um, liquor…
New England’s geography is not what you think. You’re probably familiar with one or two of Geoff Gibson’s 15 geography facts about New England, but you might not know that Maine’s coastline in a straight line would be a mere 228 miles long, but jagged as it is, it runs 3,478 miles. Or that Vermont’s official state fossil is the beluga whale because there was temporarily a Champlain Sea, left after the ice age. And New England’s bedrock includes fragments from Europe and Africa, the result of ancient continental collisions. And that while New England is one of the most densely populated areas of the US, it’s also one of the most heavily forested. It’s a fun video.
The Tuesday crossword. It’s puzzle maestro Laura Braunstein’s mini, just some three- and five-letter words. Piece of cake. If you’re just catching up, you can find her earlier puzzles here.
Today's Wordbreak. With a word from yesterday’s Daybreak.
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HEADS UP
Hans Williams, Brooks Hubbard, Phin, and others in a holiday fundraiser for the Haven at Sawtooth Kitchen. As Sawtooth writes, “Proceeds from ticket and merch sales will help your neighbors through the long winter ahead. All tickets are Pay What You Can, suggested donation $20 per ticket, give generously!” Starts up at 7 pm.
And you’ll want to know today about tomorrow’s inaugural Deck the Hill community ski at Oak Hill Outdoor Center. That’s because it’s at 9 am and you might want to wax tonight—just think of all that fresh snow! “We'll glide and slide as a community before sharing donuts, cookies, and cocoa in and around the new lodge and fire pit,” Oak Hill writes. “Come to train Norwegian-style, stay to socialize.” There’s an all-comers interval training session at 8 am, if you’re feeling ambitious.
The Tuesday poem.
As if to spare the birds at the feeder
any more competition than they already have,
a snowflake drops right past the perches
crowded with finches, nuthatches, sparrows,
and without even thinking to open its wings
settles quietly onto the ground.
— “Cold” by Ted Kooser. This was the Dec. 23 poem Kooser sent on a postcard to his friend, the writer Jim Harrison—a series later collected as Winter Morning Walks: 100 Postcards to Jim Harrison.
See you tomorrow.
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