TRASH TALK also inside: DRUGS IN THE KINGDOM DEALING WITH SEXUAL VIOLENCE MENTAL HEALTH TRAINING FOR COPS
Volume 4, Issue 2
Electronic Journalism Arts
10
A Top U.S. Journalism Program NEWSPRO MAGAZINE DEC 2013
LY N D O N S TAT E C O L L E G E Writers: Katrina Floranza Julianne Walshaw Joe Rivet Corey Wells
With assistance from Joe Gluck, Samantha Knight, Tyler Dumont. Adviser: Dan Williams
NewsINK is a publication of the Vermont Center for Community Journalism at Lyndon State College. Find us online at Issuu.com/newsink. Address queries to NewsINK, Department of Electronic Journalism Arts, Lyndon State College, PO Box 919, Lyndonville, Vt. 05851
Accelerate your degree this summer. Missing a few courses? Eager to get ahead or graduate early? Need to retake a class you failed? Want to pursue graduate study? Advance your career? All while enjoying the best of Vermont?
Summer Session
Want to know more? The complete summer course listing and registration information is at LyndonState.edu/summer, or contact Student Services at 802 626-6396 studentaccount@lsc.vsc.edu.
2014 summer
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Face to face with sexual violence
Story By Katrina Floranza
Mike: I remember that when the assault first happened, I wasn’t quite sure if I had told him to stop. But as I look back at it, I remember saying, “No! Please stop, please stop!”
Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN): An American is sexually assaulted every 2 minutes.
Mike: I couldn’t report it. I didn’t trust them (authorities).
RAINN: 60% of sexual assaults are not reported.
Mike: He’s never said sorry to this day.
RAINN: 97% of rapists never spend a day in jail.
Photo illustration by Katrina Floranza
Mike – not his real name – is a Lyndon State College student who has chosen to reveal his experiences with sexual assault. The incident happened at another school. “I finally want to talk about it, because maybe someone who’s been in my situation could finally get the help they need,” he says. “They need help. I don’t know anyone who could just go on and have to deal with it. I just say, ‘Get help if you need it, because if you don’t, you’re really going to hurt yourself in the process.’” The Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network estimates that 44 percent of victims of sexual
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assault are under the age of 18, while 80 percent of victims are younger than 30. “I have a lot of friends who’ve said they’ve been raped when they were younger,” Mike says. “Some people just don’t know that ‘NO’ is NO and ‘Yes’ is YES.” Mike is still uncomfortable talking about his experience. “I hid it for almost a year. It took me a long time to come to terms with it. And still, sometimes, I have problems with it. I always said, ‘I’m never going to be a victim. I know how to keep myself safe.’ And look what happened.”
A recent study of almost 300 American high school and college males found that 43 percent reported sexual coercion. Females were the perpetrators in 95 percent of the cases, according to the study, published in March in Psychology of Men and Masculinity. Vermont is trying to do something about sexual violence in schools. An annual report from the Sexual Violence Prevention Task Force updates the Vermont House of Representatives on how sexual violence prevention programs are being incorporated into educational systems for grades K-12. “There have been agencies working throughout the state for years to enhance sexual violence prevention education happening in K-12 schools,” says Bethany Pombar, a member of the Sexual Violence Prevention Task Force and a prevention specialist with the Vermont Network Against Domestic and Sexual Violence. The task force was created in 2006. “(The) Legislature wanted to take pro-active measures to help prevent sexual violence,” Pombar says. “They saw schools and youth as a great place to start to allow sexual violence prevention to occur. I think that there’s plenty of information that they can grasp being in K-12. We talk about consent. As soon as they can talk, we should be creating a cultural consent around them where we ask them if we can hug them and we ask them if we can touch them,” she continues to explain. “And they have the right to say ‘no’ and we’re cool with that. We don’t get mad at them for taking power when being offered the choice. I think that how we treat each other well, there’s no age restriction on learning about that,” concludes Pombar. FBI statistics show 121 rapes reported in Vermont in 2012 – the most recent year for which numbers are available. That’s a 17-percent decrease from 2011, and represents a rate of 19 sexual assaults per 100,000 population. In neighboring New Hampshire, the rate was 34 per 100,000 in 2012. Pombar says the number of incident reports is not the best measure of whether prevention efforts are working. “What we often see is an increase in reports after prevention information has started in the community, because people are more aware of the resources and are more able to identify experiences they had. So, we often see an increase in numbers. That doesn’t mean that more sexual violence is happening, it just means that people are reporting more.” Victims of sexual assault can have long-term effects. Some may experience sleep disorders, eating disorders, substance abuse, depression and body memories. Mike says, “I started having bizarre flashbacks. I realized I was suffering from PTSD. The flashbacks occurred when my friends were being affectionate to each other. I would get angry and passive aggressive with them. I’m still not comfortable around couples when they’re affectionate with each other.”
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Garbage goes green Story and photos by Julianne Walshaw
Vermont is known for being one of the “greenest states” in the U.S. but we didn’t get that title from our rolling green hills alone. It’s also our eco-friendly state of mind that puts us high in the ranking, and the state has plans to increase its environmental efforts well into the future. In 2012, the state passed Act 148, otherwise known as the Universal Recycling Law, an ambitious step toward reducing the amount of material that ends up in landfills. Despite our reputation, Vermonters are only recycling half the materials they could be, wasting money and resources. This year, under the law, all trash service providers must have ways for managing recyclables, and in 2015 trash haulers will need to offer curbside pickup for such materials. These preparations pave the way for when Vermonters will be required to keep recyclables out of their trash, starting on July 1, 2015. It will be illegal to throw away: • Aluminum and steel cans • Aluminum foil and pie pans • Glass bottles and jars from foods and beverages • Corrugated cardboard • White and mixed paper • Newspaper, magazines, catalogues, paper mail, and envelopes • Box board • Paper bags • Plastic bottles made from PET (polyethylene terephthalate) and HDPE (high-density polyethylene)
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The Northeast Kingdom Waste Management District’s Lyndon location focuses solely on recycling. In 2013 the nine-man crew processed 2,790 tons of recycled material. When the law goes into effect, that number will rise significantly, and Executive Director Paul Tomasi is planning for the larger haul. “We’re trying to figure out just how we’re going to handle that increased volume of recycling,” Tomasi told News7. “We do have the ability to add personnel or resources as needed, and we think we can do that in a cost effective manner. We will have increased costs whether it’s for fuel, electricity, or labor, but we will also generate additional revenue. We’re selling our recycling for, on average, $70 a ton, so there’s some money to be made there.” Vermont started recycling in earnest back in 1987, when the state closed many of its unlined landfills and provided grant money for recycling centers. Fifteen years before that, the bottle bill was implemented with a similar mission of reducing litter as well as conserving energy, increasing recycling, and creating jobs. The bottle bill places a 5-cent deposit on soft drink and beer containers, and 15 cents for liquor bottles. When the consumer is finished with the bottle, he or she can return the container to a redemption center and get that money back.
The present-day bottle bill wasn’t Vermont’s only attempt to control bottle litter. In 1953 the state passed its first bottle bill, the first of its kind in the country, which banned the sale of beer in non-refillable bottles. The law expired only four years later due to strong lobbying from the beer industry. Today some, like Sen. Robert Hartwell (D-Bennington), want to do away with the bottle law, believing the universal recycling law will be suitable enough for litter control. The Vermont Public Interest Research Group disagrees, and even says that an expansion of the bill is in order, supporting what it calls a “Bigger, Better Bottle Bill.” (See Page 7)
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(From Page 7) “The best thing you can do for recycling is build on programs that work,” said VPIRG Executive Director Paul Burns. “That means expanding the bottle bill and making sure it works well even as you expand other curbside recycling opportunities.” According to the group 85 percent of beverage containers with a nickel deposit are recycled, whereas only about 36 percent of other containers, like water, juice, and wine bottles, stay out of landfills. The group would like to see such containers added to the program. VPIRG says it’s not alone in its support of the state’s bottle bill. A study it conducted showed 93 percent of Vermonters support it as well, and less than 5 percent want to see it eliminated. “I think the bottle bill has become almost a cultural thing, for many folks it’s a really important environmental law. You might think of it as similar to the ban on billboards in the state,” Burns said. “It’s something Vermonters are proud of, that they virtually all participate in, and feel good about.” Recycling centers like NEKWMD would like to see the bill expanded as well. Tomasi said he would like to see all glass containers included under the law. “Glass is one of the few things we don’t make money on,” Tomasi said. “It would be nice if they would handle all of that and we can focus on the other things. Glass is made from sand… once you color it, it’s difficult to separate. It’s a lot easier to just get more sand and make more glass.” Adding plastic containers like water and juice bottles would not hurt Tomasi’s business much either. NEKWMD makes most of their profits from cardboard and mixed paper. Including additional containers is not the only expansion VPIRG is calling for on the existing bill. It also wants to see the state collecting the unredeemed deposits that distributors are currently keeping.
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Burns said, “This is something that takes place in seven of the 10 states that have a bottle bill program today. The unclaimed nickels are not left with the beverage industry as they are in Vermont. That could be $3 million annually helping to support recycling programs, which would be a huge benefit to the state right now.” Andy Upton, a bottle sorter at the Lyndonville Redemption Center, would hate to see the bottle bill go, “That would put me out of a job, and my friends that I’ve worked with for years, known for years, would be out of a job.” Currently more than 100 jobs across the state are dependent on the bottle bill. If the bill were to be expanded it’s estimated that nearly 100 new jobs could be created. Currently the bill that would expand the scope of the existing law is bottled up in committee, and last month a bill that would have made cuts to the law was shot down by legislators. For now it looks like the Universal Recycling Law will be working alongside the bottle redemption system as it is. Act 148 doesn’t stop at recycling. Starting in July 2016, Vermonters won’t be allowed to send lawn clippings or clean scrap wood to the landfill. In 2017, trash facilities will need to be able to manage food waste. Vermonters must start managing their own household food scraps by 2020. Curbside pickup will be provided for all of the services listed under the Universal Recycling Law, and haulers will not be allowed to charge extra for such services.
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pala
Paying the Profs LSC salaries among lowest in Northeast
Lyndon State professors are among the lowest paid academics in the Northeast, and some of them are starting to feel that it’s a bit unfair. The average full professor at Lyndon State makes $68,400 a year, according to a survey by the American Association of University
Avg. for full professors in VT: AAUP
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Professors. That may seem a fair amount at first glance, but it pales in comparison to many schools in the region. For example, AAUP says professors at private Middlebury College average $129,800 – nearly twice as much as professors at LSC – and state-supported University of Vermont pays full professors $117,600 on average. “I absolutely feel gypped – all the time,” says professor Richard Moye, who chairs LSC’s English, Philosophy, and Film Studies Department. “Nobody in the academic field is paid what they are really worth,” Moye says, but adds, “When people enter this field they know what they are getting into and they know that salaries are low across the board. If I really cared about how much money I made here, I wouldn’t be here.” Moye is retiring at the end of the year but plans to continue teaching part-time.
Lyndon is part of the Vermont State College system. The other four-year VSC schools – Johnson and Castleton – pay slightly more than LSC. Only a handful of schools in the Northeast pay less than Lyndon, according to the AAUP study: Pine Manor College in Massachusetts ($49,500), U-Maine Machias ($66,100), Russell Sage College in New York ($65,600), and U-Maine Presque Isle ($68,300).
Above: LSC education professor Tim Sturm, who says benefits help to make up for relatively low salaries for teachers at Lyndon. Opposite: LSC English professor Richard Moye says he feels “gypped” but adds nobody in academics is paid what they are worth.
Story and photos by Joe Rivet
“Yeah, we may stink at salaries,” says Tim Sturm, an education professor at LSC and longtime member of the faculty union. “But we offer very good benefits to make up for it. For example, we have good health insurance, and those things have a monetary value that needs to be considered.” Health insurance, retirement contributions and other benefits lift the average total compensation for an LSC professor to $99,100, according to the AAUP survey. That’s considerably higher, but still at the bottom among four-year colleges in Vermont. The AAUP survey says average total compensation for LSC professors is $99,100. Another monetary benefit given to LSC Professors is free tuition for their children at any Vermont State College. Additionally, it should be noted that Sturm, like Moye, will be leaving at the end of this semester. There is a bright side to the AAUP numbers. Lyndon is among the few colleges that pay female professors the same as men. Alison Lathrop, acting dean of faculty, attributes this to the formula LSC uses to determine how much each employee will be paid. “There is no gender language in our contract,” Lathrop says. “Faculty make different amounts depending on their degree completion, how long they have taught, and what faculty rank they hold.” Lathrop wouldn’t have it any other way either. “It would never be my choice to work where men and women did not recieve equal pay for equal work.” In the formula that the VSC uses to pay its employees, every year of teaching experience is worth a set amount of points, which are converted into dollars. Any degrees professors might have are also worth a certain dollar amount each. The amount of money they are awarded because of their experience and their degrees is then added to a base pay and the total amount is their annual salary. Though pay is essentially equal, there is still a large discrepancy between the number of male and female full-time teachers at LSC. Currently, there are 36 men and only 20 women. This is an improvement over 20 years ago, however, when there were 44 men and only 15 women in the teaching ranks.
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Training Police
to handle a mental health crisis
In September, a Newport man suffering a mental health crisis calls 911 to say 400 police officers have surrounded his home. He climbs on this garage roof with a rifle, and it takes hours for negotiators to end the ensuing standoff. Nobody is hurt. In November, a woman calls Burlington police to say her adult son is going berserk. When officers arrive, he attacks them with a shovel. He is shot and killed. In April, a Bennington man with a history of mental problems enters the Police Department and is shot when he brandishes a knife. He survives, but requires hospitalization. Image: News7
Story by Corey Wells
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Vermont State Police Photo
Derrick Niles held police at bay for hours on the roof of his Newport garage. In April, he received a deferred sentence after pleading no contest to a misdemeanor charge of reckless endangerment, according to the Caledonian-Record.
A report to the Vermont Legislature says the state should require every police officer to be trained to deal with people experiencing a mental health crisis. As of the end of last year, 853 law officers had taken a special course offered by the Vermont Police Academy. That’s 68 percent of all full-time law officers, according to the report. Among part-time officers, the percentage drops to 21. The person who created the course is Cindy Taylor-Patch, director of training at the Vermont Police Academy. The Legislature set aside $20,000 for the training, but none of the money was spent last year, according to the report. Taylor-Patch says the training really doesn’t cost that much. “We are debating what to do with the money going forward,” she says. “There is a project coming out of the Vermont Department of Mental Health that will be law enforcement focused as well. They will have hired someone temporarily to conduct it so there is big cost there, but once the grant period is over, they’ve asked us to take it over and the cost will decrease significantly as long as we are able to absorb it into our regular offerings.” The course Taylor-Patch created is called “Interacting with People Experiencing a Mental Health Crisis.” According to the report, the program emphasizes the “officer’s awareness of issues regarding interaction with people who have psychiatric and/or developmental disabilities.” It also gives police the tools to “assist them in de-escalating people in crisis.” The program trains officers on mental health conditions, recognizing disabilities, Vermont laws related to mental health treatment, and the roles of the mental health system. The officers learn all of this in a six-hour program. Almost every Vermont State trooper has taken the course – 323 out of 339 – as of Dec. 31, 2013. But law enforcement agencies in the Northeast Kingdom have a mixed record of participation. All of Lyndonville’s three officers had taken the course as of the end of 2013, but only five of 17 St. Johnsbury officers had. Out of 20 officers in the Caledonia County Sheriff’s Office nine had taken the course. In the Essex County Sheriff’s Office, nine of 15 officers were trained by the end of 2013. In addition to mandatory training for all police officers, the advisory group says the program should also be a requirement for Taser certification. The report also recommends that Vermont create mobile crisis response teams around the state.
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Opioids and Overdose Story By Katrina Floranza
It took a tragedy to get Nancy Bassett off heroin. “My husband overdosed and died, and that’s when I realized that’s what drugs can do,” says Bassett, a recovering addict. “I wanted to be alive for my son. And that’s what really stopped me from doing heroin again.” Bassett now runs Kingdom Recovery Center in St. Johnsbury, a support facility for people trying to kick alcohol or drug habits. It is staffed primarily by former users. “Drugs are really hard to stay away from if you’ve been addicted – it like calls you,” she tells News7. Gov. Peter Shumlin felt that heroin was such a serious problem for Vermont that he focused his State of the State Address on it. He said since 2000, heroin use in Vermont has risen almost 800 percent. Shumlin’s spotlight drew the attention of national media. Rolling Stone caused a stir with an article illustrated by a drawing of a maple syrup maker injecting himself. The New York Times also wrote an article focusing on heroin use in Bennington. Keith Whitcomb, a reporter for the Bennington Banner, said it’s a problem in the town – but Bennington isn’t alone.
“It’s definitely grown over the past decade, I’d say, but it’s not like you can walk down the street and get conned by a drug dealer,” Whitcomb says. “If you’re not looking for it, I don’t think you’d really find it. But if you live here long enough, you’ll see it.” Whitcomb says many people in town thought the New York Times article was unfair. “They made us like the heroin capital of the state and really, it’s not the case. It’s bad, but it’s not as bad as it looks or is made out to be.” Couriers bring the heroin to Bennington from New York, Whitcomb says, carrying 100 to 300 packages at a time. “They’ll sell it to people in bulk, and then those people will sell it in smaller amounts,” he says. “So, they’re kind of like the trucks that deliver foods to stores.” Other towns are starting to see more and more drug abuse, too. Kingdom Recovery’s Nancy Bassett says St. Johnsbury is no exception. “It may be more so lately that I’m seeing more heroin use in the area, but we are also seeing just as much addiction to prescription drugs, opiates, and pain pills,” Bassett says. “There’s also more of an addiction to prescription drugs, which are bought on the street.” A report submitted by the head of the Vermont Department of Health says accidental drug overdose deaths in Vermont overwhelmingly involve prescription opiates, such as Percocet and OxyContin. The report concludes, however, that the number of deaths has not shown a trend up or down since 2006, averaging 50 per year.
Photo illustration by Katrina Floranza
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Photo by Samantha Knight
Nancy Bassett, a recovering addict, runs Kingdom Recovery Center in St. Johnsbury.
Bassett says prescription drugs can serve as a gateway to heroin. “Young people nowadays find prescription drugs in their homes. They find it from their moms, grandparents, parents, and then they pass it around. They say ‘try this,’ and they do. And they like it. And eventually, they realize they can’t keep stealing from their mother or grandmother and they buy it on the street. The dealer might say, ‘I don’t have those pills right now, but I’ve got some heroin, try it’ and then they do. And they get addicted.” A Lyndon State College student, whom we will call Thomas, believes that heroin addiction can result from trying to deal with emotional problems. “From my first-hand experience, watching one of my best friends struggle with his addiction to heroin—after our other best friend died—I know that there is a strong connection between stress or depression and the use of these drugs.” He said a lot of people use prescription drugs in his hometown of Montpelier. “Those who aren’t addicted yet, they get seriously hooked in at small amounts. I think heroin and opiate drugs are so popular because many feel like there’s not a lot to do in this state.” Thomas says a lot users in Montpelier go to Barre to get drugs. “If people and the government did more in some of the problems areas of Vermont, the drug issues in other towns like Montpelier wouldn’t be so bad.” He adds, “Vermont seems to have an innocent image about it, like it’s been untouched by the outside world. This drug issue is the first time Vermont seems to have the same problem as other states.” Kingdom Recovery’s Bassett says when she was using she would go to Massachusetts every three days and
bring back heroin. “The problem with heroin is that it’s so readily available. It’s just like a pipeline.” Her advice to anyone addicted to any type of drug: “Reach out. You know, tell somebody. Talk to people. If you realize you have a problem and you want to do something about it—there are a number of places here in St. Johnsbury and all around Vermont that can help.” Officials in the Northeast Kingdom are taking steps to save lives of drug users. The St. Johnsbury Police Department was one of the first in the area to train its officers to administer Narcan – a drug that can reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. “The purpose of the Narcan in this particular case is to bring somebody out of a drug overdose,” Chief Clement Houde says. “So, an officer who’s responding to a call comes across somebody who’s unconscious with shallow breathing and looks around the scene and sees that there’s been some drug use—whether intentional or accidental—and the officer can administer a dose of Narcan to bring them out of that unconscious state.” Narcan is administered through the nose. Houde says it won’t hurt people who are not experiencing an overdose. “It’s a situation where you almost can’t lose. It’s a chance to save somebody’s life and there’s almost no risk to it.” Though Narcan is a handy tool, Chief Houde says, “I don’t know that it’s going to change drug use. Drug use is a different problem and we’re certainly doing what we can to address that piece. But we are out there to save lives as well. Our number one priority is to save lives.”
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