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Serving Addison and Chittenden Counties
May 22, 2010
The day Long Pond gave way By Betsy Day & Brian Faulkner newmarketpress@denpubs.com
GLOVER, Vt.—An earth-shattering event, set for celebration in a small Northeast Kingdom community, recalls the day when Long Pond burst its banks 200 years ago and changed people's lives forever. An engineer estimated that the pond must have contained 1.988 billion gallons of water. The event left behind incredible destruction and an entertaining story—a story that gets told and retold every June around the remnants of the Vermont pond. In fact, some folks think the story of Long Pond—now popularly called Runaway Pond—has become even bigger than the event itself. That's why most everybody in the vicinity of Glover and Barton
probably has plans to turn out the weekend of June 6 to commemorate and talk about Runaway Pond. And for people who live beyond the cluster of small communities south and west of Lake Memphremagog in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom or in fact, just about anywhere, the Runaway Pond object lesson is worth considering: that it’s just plain dumb to tinker with Mother Nature. The story begins innocently enough during the opening days of June 1810. The owner of a grist mill decided that the stream that turned his stones wasn’t working hard enough, as the countryside was in the grip of a drought that had turned the water flow to a trickle. So why not help things along? Several miles up the valley, a small pond fed his stream. And there was another,
much bigger, pond above that. Trouble was, the stream from the big pond flowed south—the other way, a fact that was not likely to change on its own considering things had been like that for something like 10,000 years. So the miller, whose name was Willson, gathered a willing crowd, hiked up the rugged valley and began digging a trench at the north end of the pond to direct what he hoped would be a workable stream down toward his mill. All went well until the first bit of water began to flow over the lip they had chopped out of the hardpan that was holding the pond back and determining that its outflow would go south instead of north, which was of no value to Willson whatsoever. The water disappeared down the hole
See LONG POND, page 11
Vt. Legislature: the ‘Good, the Bad and the Ugly’
Moosalamoo Association to host park educators
By John McClaughry newmarketpress@denpubs.com MONTPELIER—From the standpoint of preserving the state's solvency, making life easier for revenue-generating businesses, and defending our liberties, the 2010 legislature's work is a mixed bag of the good, the bad and the ugly. Facing a $154 million deficit in January, the legislature produced what it claims is a balanced budget without broad based tax increases. In fact, in the face of Gov. JIM Douglas’ not so veiled veto threat, it even lightened the business tax burden by allowing many Vermont businesses to claim the full 9 percent domestic production credit against state taxes as well as federal. It also liberalized capital gains treatment for investments in Vermont businesses. To reach a putatively balanced general fund budget, the legislators made changes in the two state retirement plans ($17 million), and continued a state employee pay freeze ($9 million). But the remainder of this apparent fiscal miracle contains two highly suspect elements. Internal human service program changes are credited with a $39 million spending reduction, and the "Challenges for Change" initiative is "assumed" to produce another $38 million. The former is too complicated to grasp, and the latter— amusingly touted by Douglas as "reforming government"— is highly speculative. The "Challenges" effort was conceived as a way of streamlining state government and thereby saving money without reducing any programs or services. The $38 million in "assumed" savings put forth by the highly overpaid consultants last January was apparently based on no analysis at all. Next January, when another $122 million in savings must be found, be prepared to hear that much of the "assumed" Challenge for Change savings failed to materialize, and it was the other guy's fault. Perhaps the most notable achievement, other than
LEAN AND GREEN—Justin Lyman, a worker for Davey Tree Expert Company and a Central Vermont Public Service contractor, works high in a tree along a Middlebury CVPS right-of-way last week. Starting June 1, all CVPS forestry contractors will be required to use a new bar and chain oil made from animal fat, effectively removing 5,000 gallons of petroleum-based oil from Vermont's environment. CVPS is the first utility in the country to replace petroleum-based oil with oil that bacteria will devour. It breaks down in a few days. Photo by Steve Costello
See LEGISLATURE, page 10
GOSHEN—The Moosalamoo Association, a stewardship partner with the U.S. Forest Service for the management of the Moosalamoo National Recreation Area, will host a crew of Vermont Youth Conservation Corps Park Educators providing environmental education and naturalist programming within the NRA and surrounding community. The five Park Educators will be working in the Moosalamoo National Recreation Area and in Branbury State Park, engaging in trail education projects providing environmental education to visitors and the community. Some of the focus topics will be on invasive species, Leave No Trace T ethics, & land stewardship. Leave No TraceT is a national and international program designed to assist outdoor enthusiasts with their decisions about how to reduce their impacts when they hike, camp, picnic, snowshoe, run, bike, hunt, paddle, ride horses, fish, ski or climb. Moosalamoo NRA is a 20,000-acre region of public and private land nestled in the Green Mountain National Forest. Moosalamoo's diverse ecosystem is home to a large number of plants and animals. The region is also a recreation area for wildlife viewing, blueberry picking, hiking, biking, cross-country skiing, snow shoeing, picnicking, and camping.
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