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AUGUST 28, 2025
Artist Rebecca Padula
WILLISTON’S NEWSPAPER SINCE 1985
‘Brazen’ theft: Painting lifted from library
Any artist displaying work at a public library will be required to sign a waiver releasing the library from responsibility for their art pieces. Hinesburg painter Rebecca Padula, who showed her work through the month of August at the Dorothy Alling Memorial Library, said she could envision a library patron mistakenly brushing up against a hung painting, causing it to fall and possibly get damaged. But — although the waiver does contemplate the possibility of theft — Padula never imagined that
Bellwether School closes after 30 years Parents, school founder hoping for relaunch BY JASON STARR Observer staff For the first time since September 1995, Bellwether School in Williston will not be welcoming students into its modest building on South Brownell Road for a new academic year. An alternative nonprofit school that followed a holistic, student-centered approach, Bellwether enrolled up to 60 preschool through fifth grade students at its peak. But in recent years, it had become more difficult to retain students as they aged into the elementary school grades. The school’s board of directors made the decision last winter that
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2024-2025 would be the school’s final academic year — at least for now. Mike Foote, the parent of a Bellwether kindergartner last year, was already planning to move his daughter into Richmond public schools for its Spanish immersion program, but he still mourns the loss of the school as an independent educational option in the community. Bellwether drew students from Williston, Richmond, South Burlington, Essex and Hinesburg. “We just feel so much gratitude towards the school and the staff,” Foote said. “Our daughter is leaving with next level skills in treating other people with kindness and navigating big emotions. It really supported her curiosity and sense of adventure.” “It really was something special,” he added, “and it’s kind of
would actually happen. On Aug. 20, she received a call from library staff. They had witnessed a patron lift a Padula painting off the wall and swiftly exit the library. Staff followed the thief, recorded the license plate of her getaway car and called Williston Police. The case is still under investigation, according to Lt. Eric Shepard. Police are looking for a red sport utility vehicle as a “vehicle of interest,” he said. “It’s kind of flattering, but not as flattering
as when someone actually buys a painting and values it,” Padula said Wednesday morning as she removed her pieces from a library wall, the monthlong display having run its course. Titled “At The Edge of Town,” the show featured oil paintings of various sizes depicting abstract interpretations of rural New England landscapes. The stolen painting wasn’t the only one that Padula won’t return home with: She also made a sale. see PAINTING page 8
Bellwether School on South Brownell Road will be empty this year for the first time since its founding 30 years ago. OBSERVER PHOTO BY JASON STARR
heartbreaking that it had to shut down.” Although his two children are now committed to Richmond public schools, Foote continues to serve on Bellwether’s board of directors, along with others who are exploring ways the school could be revived. Among them is Ron Miller, who cofounded the school in 1995. “Several of the parents said, ‘we don’t want it to close. We’re going try to bring it back.’ And I
got involved because, well, I started it once, I thought I could help start it again,” Miller said. The school owns the building, which is situated across from the former Edge fitness center in a mostly commercial-industrial area of town. The board is looking for community members interested in alternative education to join its ranks. “We would love to have more hands on deck to help bring the school back,” Miller said.
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Opinions differ among board members about what led to the declining enrollment; Foote and Miller both agree that the school lacked effective marketing. You could easily drive by it on South Brownell and not realize you had passed a school. “There was really not much marketing to speak of, and I think that was a missed opportunity,” Foote said. see BELLWETHER page 9
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