LIBERTY DARR STAFF WRITER
A Charlotte Selectboard subcommittee is forming to iron out the details of an agreement that governs the relationship between Charlotte Volunteer Fire and Rescue Service and the town.
Selectboard members Kelly Devine and Frank Tenney will serve on the subcommittee alongside delegates from the fire and rescue service.
“The town and the board of directors for the department will get together and draft a series of recommended amendments for that
See CVFRS on page 13
The role of Hinesburg fire chief will transition into a full-time position, which the town expects to fill by late summer.
The change, which was approved by the selectboard last week, followings fire chief
Nick Baker’s announcement that he will be stepping down from his position, which he has been serving in a part-time capacity since the spring of 2021.
“Moving forward, I think if we were to continue to have a part-time chief, we’re functional, but we’re missing some items here,” Baker told selectboard members
ahead of Monday’s vote. “As the town continues to grow, the demands for the fire department’s services and also the demands on whoever the fire chief is — they’re still growing.”
Baker has been leading the Hinesburg Fire Department while holding a separate full-time job, and he suggested that he
decided to step down to have more time for his family. The transition to a full time-position comes, in part, because of Baker’s experience trying to perform the job within the time granted by a part-time role.
See FIRE CHIEF on page 12
PHOTO BY GLENN RUSSELL/VTDIGGER
‘There was no right vote’: Wildlife bill dies in divided Vermont House
SHAUN ROBINSON VTDIGGER
Attorneys representing national anti-abortion advocates and two Vermont-based crisis pregnancy centers argued before a judge on Thursday that a 2023 state law subjecting the facilities to false and misleading advertising statutes amounted to “viewpoint discrimination.”
But the state’s top prosecutors, who have asked a judge to dismiss the groups’ lawsuit challenging the law, maintained that the measure does not specifically target anti-abortion speech.
statutes did not apply to pregnancy centers because the facilities offer their services for free — therefore falling outside the bounds of those rules. Act 15 added such centers to the types of organizations covered by the statute, regardless of whether they charge.
The state has moved to dismiss the lawsuit on the basis that the law merely prevents “deceptive advertising” and “unprofessional conduct.” The two pregnancy centers have not claimed that they engage in either practice, so should not be restricted by the law, the state argued.
Over the last several years, a debate over how to manage wildlife has become a symbol of a broader cultural divide in Vermont. During the recently concluded legislative session, that debate culminated in S.258, a bill that would have changed the state’s wildlife management structure.
Many supporters of the measure saw it as a pathway to create common ground between those who want to protect wildlife from certain hunting practices and those who fear the implications of a cultural shift away from hunting in Vermont.
Some lawmakers who opposed the bill — or didn’t want to vote on it — feared it would prompt more division. That appears to be the reason the bill failed.
It became a “lightning rod for some of the intensity around” the wildlife debate, said Rep. Katherine Sims, D-Craftsbury, co-chair of the tripartisan Rural Caucus. S.258 focused largely on the Vermont Fish & Wildlife Board, a citizen group in charge of creating rules to manage the state’s game species. At present, it is stacked
See WILDLIFE BILL on page 9
The law, known as Act 15, makes such centers subject to civil action if they engage in “unfair and deceptive” practices, or if any of their employees provide services that they aren’t licensed for under existing professional standards.
According to the lawsuit, which was filed last year, those measures put unconstitutional restrictions on the centers’ ability to market to and serve their clients. The plaintiffs allege violations of both the First and 14th amendments.
They include Aspire Now, a crisis pregnancy center in Williston; Branches Pregnancy Resource Center, another in Brattleboro; and National Institute of Family and Life Advocates, a nationwide anti-abortion advocacy nonprofit affiliated with the two Vermont facilities. A similar facility, Lamoille Valley Pregnancy Resource Center, recently opened in Morrisville.
Crisis pregnancy centers are nonmedical facilities that advertise themselves to pregnant patients, offering some basic obstetrics — such as pregnancy tests and ultrasounds — while actively seeking to dissuade patients from obtaining abortions. There are seven such facilities in Vermont, including in Barre, Middlebury and Rutland, according to the University of Georgia’s Crisis Pregnancy Center Map.
Many such facilities ramped up their activity nationwide after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade case precedent in 2022. With the federal right to an abortion revoked and dozens of states outlawing or restricting access to the procedure, pregnancy centers have proliferated to fill the void.
Prior to the passage of the Vermont law, the state’s consumer protection and false advertising
The centers therefore have no standing to sue over its provisions, said David McLean, an assistant Vermont Attorney General, speaking to Judge William K. Sessions III in U.S. District Court in Burlington.
Also, McLean said that the law only targets false and misleading commercial speech, which is not protected by the First Amendment and falls under the state’s regulatory authority.
Mercer Martin, an attorney representing the plaintiffs, pushed back on that characterization, arguing that Vermont lawmakers and Attorney General Charity Clark — whose office has authority to investigate violations of the law — have instead repeatedly shown political opposition to those facilities, specifically.
Martin, a fellow at the national conservative Christian legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom, pointed to lawmakers’ “legislative intent” language outlining how some pregnancy centers, broadly, can mislead people seeking care. He also noted a 2023 open letter, signed by Clark and 15 other states’ attorneys general, detailing their concerns with the facilities nationwide.
Martin said the language in the law is too vague for Vermont’s crisis pregnancy centers to be sure that their existing practices wouldn’t be subject to enforcement actions, which could include a fine of up to $10,000.
That lack of clarity extends both to how the centers can advertise, but also around what kind of services they are authorized to provide, he said.
As an example of a current advertising practice that could be impacted, Martin described how the centers run ads on search engines that appear when people
Jonathan Gicewicz and Josh Leggett both live in Vermont, but they met in the virtual world — as avid traders of cryptocurrency.
“I had been an early crypto investor, and I had met a lot of people through it and that’s how I met Josh,” said Gicewicz, a 47-year-old Rutland resident and owner of a graphic design business, JEG Design.
Leggett, 41, a Hinesburg native who now lives in Richmond, has worked primarily in construction and sales for a major home services company. After meeting Gicewicz in the crypto realm, he joined the fellow Vermonter in a new business venture that’s grounded in real products. The two realized they not only shared a love of crypto trading but also merchandise with trend-driven, street-inspired designs.
Gicewicz founded Funky Flies in 2020 to develop real art by artists — not just virtual renditions of work — and apply it to products for use in the real world. His co-founder in the business, artist Lisa Sotero, 54, creates the designs for all Funky Flies merchandise. Their bestseller, the Cat and Dog SkateBowl, embeds stainless steel pet feeding bowls in colorful skateboard decks. The company also produces coloring books and clothing, bath towels and bottles of bug spray.
Sotero’s art is the backbone of the company, which sells only through its website. On a video call with the three partners, Sotero described her style as low-brow, combining bright colors, wild graphics and graffiti-reminiscent prints.
“Everything you see has been hand-drawn at one time or another,” Leggett, marketing manager for Funky Flies, said.
The Funky Flies team works to keep their business focused on community and the human design process, straying away from the trend of art created by artificial intelligence.
Sotero said her artistic process starts with pen and paper. Then she moves to the computer to finalize her designs, adding vivid yellows, vibrant blues and neon pinks to bug-eyed animals and psychedelic images. “You can’t get the same quality with AI (artificial intelligence),” she said.
Gicewicz, Sotero and another partner who is no longer working with the company started their collaboration in the world of cryptocurrency through NFTs, or non-fungible tokens. An NFT is a digital representation of a real item, such as a work of art or media. An NFT is unique to that singular item and cannot be copied, and its rarity gives it value in the trading market.
Before turning to tangible products, Funky Flies launched in the form of more than 125 Sotero art pieces for sale as NFTs for anywhere from $80 to $3,000, eventually earning the team enough money to give to organi-
zations dedicated to social change.
For their first philanthropic foray, the owners took some of their banked crypto funds to donate 100 skateboards, complete with wheels and trucks, to the Ugandan Skateboard Society, an entity devoted to “spreading the joy of skateboarding worldwide,” according to the Funky Flies website.
The Vermont entrepreneurs say they see skateboarding as a tool to unite people across the world via the shared love of the sport. They sent 21 boxes of goods worth $50,000, Gicewicz said, calling it “one of the largest donations in Ugandan history.”
They left the crypto world to shift to merchandise to bring in a broader audience than the NFTs alone, Gicewicz and Leggett say. Funky Flies sells a range of products featuring Sotero’s art: hoodies, puzzles, yoga mats and mugs. The items are made by multiple suppliers both inside and outside Vermont, according to Leggett, who says he assembles the skateboard decks himself in Richmond.
The founders strive to give customers a sense of fulfillment through their support of a small, independent business.
Frank Herrera has known the Funky Flies founders since their NFT start and now purchases their skateboards, one of which was hanging on the wall behind him during a video interview.
“For me, customer service speaks loudly for the ethics and the atmosphere of a company, and for Funky Flies, it is top-notch,” Herrera said. “They’re approachable. They’re real people.”
The three partners said they’d like to reach more consumers who connect with the artwork. They also want to continue with philanthropy, giving back to communities in Vermont and beyond. They plan to grow Funky Flies’ business through small-scale social media campaigns and local and national partnerships, Leggett said.
“It’s small right now, but we’ve got some big ideas going forward,” he said. “It’s been a fun little ride so far and with more to come.”
The Community News Service is a program in which University of Vermont students work with professional editors to provide content for local news outlets at no cost.
Total incidents: 57 Traffic Stops: 9
May 8 at 7:51 a.m., officers responded to a domestic dispute on Majestic Lane.
Mary Wildasin, 55, of Hinesburg, was arrested for domestic assault.
May 9 at 12:07 p.m., a loose dog was located on Hillview Terrace and later returned to its owner.
May 10 at 7 a.m., an officer investigated a noise complaint on Hollow Road.
May 10 at 9:05 p.m., an officer responded to Main Road in Huntington to assist Vermont State Police with a shooting investigation.
May 11 at 11:30 a.m., a loose dog was located on Route 116 and later returned to its owner.
May 11 at 3:13 p.m., officers responded to Hillview Terrace for the report of suspicious activity. Joseph Robar, 37, of Hinesburg, was arrested for disorderly conduct.
May 12 at 2:25 p.m., an officer
responded to Pond Brook Road for the report of an abandoned vehicle.
May 13 at 3:35 p.m., police investigated an animal complaint on Hayden Hill Road.
May 13 at 4:30 p.m., two loose dogs were located on North Road and later returned to their owner.
May 13 at 4:54 p.m., an officer responded to CVU Road for a report of a man having a mental health crisis causing a traffic hazard.
May 14 at 3:48 p.m., an officer responded to a juvenile issue on Hillview Terrace.
May 17 at 7 a.m., an officer investigated a burglary on Commerce Street.
May 17 at 3:30 p.m., two loose dogs were turned in at the police station. The owners were later located.
Note: Charges filed by police are subject to review by the Chittenden County State’s Attorney Office and can be amended or dropped.
May 14 at 7:54 p.m., police arrested Jennifer Lisle, 54, of Charlotte for driving under the
influence, first offense, after arriving to a one-vehicle crash on Spear Street in Charlotte.
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Elizabeth Campbell sat on the 30-acre property in Monkton that will soon house four Vermonters with developmental disabilities in a housing project known as Riverflow — an initiative looking to redefine what environments of inclusion can look like.
care, and needs help expressing himself, shared living where he’d be a guest in a series of strangers’ homes was not what we wanted for him.”
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The Shelburne resident had a vision for this space long before it became a reality, and now as painters and handymen roam in and out of the eight-bedroom house, her longtime advocacy efforts for Vermonters with disabilities are finally bearing fruit.
The issues are close to home for Campbell since her son Jesse was diagnosed at 15 with Down Syndrome Regression Disorder, something she describes as a particularly disabling variation of Down Syndrome.
While it’s common for many parents to fear what will happen to their children when they step out into the world on their own, for Campbell and the many parents she advocates for, that fear is compounded with a lack of options for their children.
“We, like most Vermonters, were surprised to learn that the only housing option for someone like Jesse, is adult foster care, a shared living provider program in Vermont,” she said, adding that although that model works well for some families, it is not the ideal model for all. “For someone like my son, Jesse, who requires 24/7
The realities for her adult son were maximized after the death of her husband in 2020. While processing her grief, Campbell was also simultaneously charged with finding solutions in a system that for so long has left some families behind.
“I realized that Jesse was that much closer to ending up in shared living or adult foster care once I was no longer able to care for him,” she said.
So, she did what any concerned parent would do: she wrote an op-ed to local newspapers and media outlets. And it turned out, there were parents everywhere across the state who felt the same way. Over 100 parents formed a group called the Developmental Disabilities Housing Initiative, that advocated for more options than just the shared-living model.
Aside from advocacy efforts, the group went to the Legislature and in 2022 was influential in the passage of Act 186, which appropriated $500,000 to develop innovative housing options for Vermonters with developmental disabilities.
The Campbell family, in conjunction with another family, Waitsfield residents Amy and Jim Caffry, submitted a grant application and were awarded $170,000. That is, more or less, when the Riverflow community began. Then
Campbell found Hannah Schwartz, who has over 20 years of experience in instituting intentional living communities and now acts as the project’s community coordinator. But the happenstance of finding the property was nothing short of serendipitous.
“That day, I decided to go for a bike ride,” Campbell said. “I was very anxious, and I’ve never ridden in Monkton before, and I decided that day I would ride in Monkton and I kept checking my email and a mile from this house, I found out that we were awarded a pilot planning grant.”
Schwartz said after that point the group hit the ground running with planning initiatives, since the grant money was not intended to be used to buy brick-and-mortar purchases. But the main house is just the beginning of even more planned houses the team hopes to build. The dream is to grow Riverflow into a four-home community with vegetable and perennial gardens, chickens and sheep, and numerous vocational learning programs.
“Whether you live here directly or not what I’ve experienced in intentional communities that are healthy, and I’ve traveled world looking at the model and studied them, the communities that have the most to do with their extended communities are the healthiest. For friends with special needs, they have so much to offer,” she said.
If you can’t stand the heat, you may want to get out of the kitchen, but given today’s climate you might want to skip politics as well. And if you’re quite serious, you should probably consider taking up residence on another planet, one not including the Republican Party. With climate scientists delivering dire warnings of rising temperatures in the north Atlantic, and the GOP, along with right-to-life stalwarts, abandoning the notion that life begins at conception, the upcoming hurricane season will encompass way more than weather.
Most telling is how quickly even the staunchest anti-abortion advocates were willing to jettison their sanctimonious chest thumping over fetal personhood the moment Donald Trump flip flopped after being told that if he didn’t do an about face on a woman’s right to choose, he might be fomenting the next big lie from a post-election prison cell.
And poof, there it all went. Fifty years of political bullshit masquerading as “save the babies,” thrown under the bus in the blink of an eye. It remains to be seen what other supposedly strongly held beliefs Christians and Republicans are willing to compromise at the behest of the former president, but their abandonment of this fundamental doctrine — essentially the very foundation of the movement — demands of them a very distinct, round peg/square hole choice: pro-life or pro-Trump. They can’t have it both ways.
If a zygote is a baby, which everyone in this demographic has adamantly insisted for decades, and abortion kills babies, why does it suddenly make a difference at what stage they’re killed? Or “executed” as per the always eloquent former president.
You might think Trump instantaneously becoming the most pro-choice Republican presidential candidate in 50 years would find him hemorrhaging a substantial portion of the MAGA electorate, more specifically the “abortion is murder” crowd, like Maine state Rep. Michael Lemelin. Claiming last week that God was complicit in the Lewiston mass shooting last
October that killed 18 people, as well as “the storms that wreaked havoc” on the state over the winter, Lemelin must have been surprised that his national cohorts, after hardly a whimper, made it clear the only god whose wrath they fear lives in Mar-a-Lago.
The pro-life establishment responded, including Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, Students for Life, Faith and Freedom Coalition, Family Research Council, National Right to Life and Catholic Vote, all quickly reiterating their commitment to reelecting Trump. Wait, what?
That’s right. The former president is an apostate and rather than challenge him, the entirety of the choose life infrastructure decided to become apostates right along with him because it’s never been about babies pre-born, post-born or anywhere in between.
Sanctimonious Christians lean heavily on the mythology that their movement began in 1973, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion in Roe v. Wade, galvanizing Christians into what became a 50-year quest to overturn the decision. Reality is far less flattering with the squeaky-clean image of evangelicals collapsing under even a superficial level of scrutiny. What galvanized the religious right were the usual objects of Republican idolatry: racial discrimination and money.
It wasn’t until six years later, in 1979, that the so-called Moral Majority took up the abortion cause, although not for the moral reasons they cite but rather as an effort to deny President Jimmy Carter a second term. Why? Because his reelection would likely have revoked the tax-exempt status of the segregated southern schools established years earlier to avoid compliance with Brown v. Board of Education.
Writing in Politico in 2014, Dartmouth professor Randall Balmer explained: “Both before and for several years after Roe, evangelicals were overwhelmingly indifferent to the subject, which they considered a ‘Catholic issue.’ In 1968, for instance, a symposium sponsored by the Christian Medical Society and Christianity Today, the flagship magazine of evangelicalism, refused to characterize abortion as sinful, citing individual health, family welfare and social
responsibility as justifications for ending a pregnancy.”
Although as governor of California, Carter’s opponent, Ronald Reagan, had signed into law the most liberal abortion legislation in the country, while addressing a 1980 rally of 10,000 evangelicals at Reunion Arena in Dallas, he never mentioned it once. Instead, he railed over the “unconstitutional regulatory agenda” directed by the IRS “against independent schools.”
The abortion debate has never been about babies preborn, post-born or anywhere in between.
Protecting the unborn was never the catalyst behind the
modern anti-abortion movement however much fundamentalist Christians insist on rewriting history. The real motivation was quickly figuring out how to retain their tax-exempt status while protecting their segregated schools.
While it’s long been established that Trump isn’t very Christian, it turns out that a lot of Christians aren’t all that Christian either, casually tossing closely held beliefs the moment they become politically inconvenient. Their deification of the former
New approach to health care needed, Meyer says
To the Editor:
Chittenden Southeast Sen. Ginny Lyons recently shared her views on Vermont’s health care system, and she seems to paint a rosy picture. As a physician working in health care, I have a very different perspective.
Vermont’s health care system has been struggling for years and Vermonters are suffering the consequences. Some of the problems are shared by other states, but there are also issues unique to Vermont.
Several governors and the Legislature have allowed, and at times encouraged, the University of Vermont Health System to become a monopoly, and UVM has done what most monopolies do — it has used its concentrated power to increase its power and steeply raise prices across the board.
Eight years ago, former Gov. Peter Shumlin signed Vermont on to a federal health care experiment called OneCare. This was supposed
to control health care costs, increase accessibility and improve quality. It has accomplished none of these goals, and its real effect has been to further increase UVM’s power since OneCare was operated through the health system.
At one point, the CEO of the University of Vermont Health Network and OneCare was the same individual.
Lyons now wants to push Vermont into a new nine-year arrangement with the feds in something called Project Ahead. In fact, this program is very similar to the failed OneCare.
One of the few encouraging developments has been the Green Mountain Care Board, which, under new leadership, is finally exercising its independent authority to deny the UVM Medical Center and other high fliers their exorbitant rate increases. But Lyons is making a strenuous effort to remove that authority and place it with the politically vulnerable Department of Human Services.
I have a different vision for the future of health care
president is nothing short of astonishing.
Michael Bender, writing in the New York Times, describes the finale of a recent Trump rally: “Soft, reflective music ... a hush falls over the crowd ... Trump’s tone turns reverent and somber ... supporters bow their heads and close their eyes ... raising open palms in the air ... murmur as if in prayer.” The Republican leader intones: “The great silent majority is rising like never before under our leadership” ... many in the crowd believe he “was chosen by God” to lead the country. No one asks, “Why him?”
Delusions are funny like that.
Walt Amses is a Vermont writer.
in Vermont, and it begins by strengthening independent practices and hospitals, which have long been the backbone of health care in our small state, especially in primary care. The independents consistently provide as good or better care at far less expense, and they are more embedded in their communities.
The UVM Medical Center should return to its original core missions: serve as the community hospital for Chittenden County and as the state’s only Level 1 trauma center; and help teach future physicians and conduct important research through its medical school.
Much of the Legislature’s work in health care issues has been opaque, both to the public and to many of the legislators themselves. Let’s open the doors and windows and have a real discussion.
Dr. Louis Meyers
South Burlington
Editor’s note: Meyers is a candidate for the Chittenden Southeast Senate seat.
The Age Well meal pickup for Thursday, May 23, is from 10 to 11 a.m. at the Charlotte Senior Center.
The meal features roast beef with sauce, diced potatoes with parsley, green beans, wheat bread, oatmeal cookie and milk.
You must pre-register by the prior Monday at 802-425-6345 or meals@charlotteseniorcentervt. org.
The suggested donation is $5. Check the website for last-minute cancellations at bit.ly/3FfyLMb.
The meal for Thursday, May 30, has not been announced.
The meal for Thursday, June 6, features roast pork loin with mashed potatoes, green beans, applesauce, wheat bread with butter, birthday cake with lemon sauce and milk.
The meal for Thursday, June 13, features meatloaf with brown sauce, mashed potatoes, mixed vegetables, wheat bread with butter, apple crisp with topping and milk.
Join the Charlotte Grange at Grandview Cemetery, 403 Church Hill Road, on Memorial Day, Monday, May 27, at 9.m. for a flag placing.
A short ceremony will include remarks from Charlotte veteran Jordan Paquette and a rendition of
years. All are welcome to join the ceremony, to place flags or both!
A celebration of life service for Joe Moore will be held Friday, May 24, from 5:30-7:30 p.m. at the First Unitarian Universalist Church at the top of Church Street, 152 Pearl St., Burlington.
All are invited. In lieu of flowers, donations can be sent to the Vermont Blues Society, 1696 Maple St., Waltham VT 05491. Donations in Joe’s name will be used to aid in the formation of the Joseph Moore Jr. Music for Youth Scholarship Fund, dedicated to supporting musical development of youth.
“Seeking Freedom: The Underground Railroad and the Legacy of an Abolitionist Family” explores America’s history of enslavement, the abolitionist movement and the Underground Railroad in a new exhibition at the Rokeby Museum on Route 7 in Ferrisburgh. It shares the history of the Robinson family and their work as abolitionists in Vermont. It explores the family’s legacy as later generations moved away from the family’s antislavery beliefs and toward a more dominant American culture.
The exhibition is a comprehensive exploration, going beyond the abolition movement and the Civil War, to discuss the legacy of American racism and prejudice and its impacts on communities today. It proudly features three Vermont organizations actively
The Aphasia Choir of Vermont will perform at South Burlington High School’s auditorium, 550 Dorset St., on Sunday, June 2,
p.m. Many South Burlington residents and stroke survivors from Chittenden County and beyond will perform at the free concert. Aphasia is a language disorder typically caused by stroke or traumatic brain injury. Because music is largely mediated by the undamaged hemispheres of the brains of people with aphasia, they can sing and are often fluent while singing even if they have severe difficulty speaking or are nonverbal. The Aphasia Choir of Vermont was the 2020 recipient of the American Stroke Association’s Stroke Hero Award for Outstanding Group. Above, The Aphasia Choir warms up before its 2023 performance at Colchester High School.
working toward equality — the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont, Peace and Justice Center in Burlington, and Vermont Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
A new addition to the exhibition is a children’s learning area, so learners of all ages can engage with history.
See the exhibition daily, 10 a.m.-5 p.m., beginning Saturday, May 25, through Oct. 13.
Weather and the sun inevitably result in a worn-out flag. If your flag is tattered or soiled and it’s time for a new one, the Charlotte Grange can help you make sure your old flag is taken care of properly.
On Memorial Day, the Grange
will be collecting worn flags from Charlotte cemeteries and taking them to the Vergennes American Legion to be “retired” in a Flag Day ceremony. If you have a flag to dispose of, bring it to the Charlotte Memorial Day event on Monday, May 27, at 9 a.m. at the Grandview Cemetery, 403 Church Hill Road, or drop it off at the Grange Hall on Spear Street between May 25 and June 2 in the covered bin.
Age Well and St. Catherine’s of Siena Parish in Shelburne are teaming up to provide a meal to go for anyone age 60 and older on Tuesday, June 11. Meals will be available for pick up in the parking lot at 72 Church St. from 11 a.m. until noon and are
available for anyone 60 or older. Suggested donation is $5.
The menu is meatloaf with gravy, mashed potatoes, mixed vegetables, wheat bread with butter, apple crisp with topping and milk.
To order a meal contact Kathleen at agewellstcath@gmail.com or 802-503-1107. Deadline to order is Wednesday, June 5. If this is a first-time order, provide your name, address, phone number and date of birth.
If you haven’t yet filled out a congregate meal registration form, bring a completed registration form with you or send one to: Age Well; 875 Roosevelt Highway, Ste. 210, Colchester VT 05446. Forms will be available at meal pick up.
Learn about restaurant tickets to dine at participating restaurants at agewellvt.org.
Aquatic invasive plant species have long threatened the health and populations of native plants in the Lewis Creek watershed. By forming dense mats of vegetation, they impede the activities of recreational boaters, swimmers and anglers while degrading ecosystems and wildlife habitats. Non-native invasive plants also create hazards by altering erosion patterns, out-competing native species and impacting water quality. Management of all invasive species can be difficult because they are easily spread via seeds, roots, fragments, animals and by humans.
Bristol Pond and Monkton Pond, popular destinations for anglers, recreational boaters and wildlife enthusiasts, both contain aquatic invasive species. As of 2023, there were three known aquatic invasive species in Bristol Pond: European frogbit, Eurasian watermilfoil and brittle naiad; and three aquatic invasive species in Monkton Pond: Eurasian watermilfoil, banded mystery snail and Chinese mystery snail. If left unmanaged, these species could spread throughout the rest of the watershed and the state. To prevent further spread, Lewis Creek Association, a local
non-profit watershed group, will launch its fourth summer of the Boat Launch Steward Program at Bristol and Monkton ponds beginning in June.
The program was created to educate the public about invasive species within the watershed. At Bristol and Monkton ponds, boat launch stewards greet boaters as they arrive at the ponds and offer to inspect their boats for aquatic invasive species, while also collecting data on where the boat has been and how many aquatic organisms they encountered.
knotweed at a site along Lewis Creek in North Ferrisburgh. Japanese knotweed is a particularly tough plant to remove; it spreads primarily by its rhizomes, which can break off during a flood then resprout and form a new colony downstream.
If left unmanaged, these invasive species could spread throughout the rest of the watershed and the state.
They educate boat owners on how to prevent the spread of invasives, which includes cleaning, draining and drying their boats, and other equipment that has been in the water, before moving to a different water body. This could even include swimsuits and life jackets, which could carry small, microscopic organisms like the fishhook waterflea, which was recently found in Lake Champlain.
In addition to staffing the ponds on the weekends, the stewards manually remove Japanese
In the Lewis Creek watershed, its distribution is patchy, and it has not yet spread prevalently across streambanks unlike in many other Vermont watersheds where it covers nearly every square foot available. Lewis Creek Association is demonstrating a non-chemical removal method to the public at a site in North Ferrisburgh, where stewards will be present weekly to lead removal efforts, and to display these methods to the public. A partnership with Mike Bald of Got Weeds? will guide this work and demonstrate effective methods for knotweed removal without herbicides. To sign up to help, got to bit.ly/lca-knotweed or reach out to Kate Kelly, program manager for the association, at lewiscreekorg@ gmail.com or 802-488-5203.
AD DEADLINE FOR MAY 30 ISSUE: Friday, May 24, Noon (All Display, BANG/Combo and Classified Ads) Our offices are closed Monday, May 27, to observe the holiday.
ILLUSTRATION BY ADELAIDE MURPHY TYROL
in midwinter, allowing very fine clay-size particles to settle out.
varve thickness across the lake floor.
The sharpest contrast between rivers and lakes is in water movement. While rivers flow inexorably downhill, lake water movement is more subtle. Anyone who has weathered a storm on a lake, however, can attest that less consistent water movement does not mean no water movement at all. In fact, at one point, about 5,000 years ago, it seems a tsunami formed on Lake Champlain.
Geologists use lake sediment cores to study lake conditions from past years. Cores are long columns of lake-floor mud sampled by driving a hollow pipe deep into the lake bed, sometimes from a boat, other times through thick winter ice. The layers of sediment collected in these cores help scientists determine past weather and environmental events.
When turbulent rivers carry sediment into lakes, the still lake waters allow the sediment to settle out and sink to the lake floor. Precipitation and river flow patterns affect how sand and silt accumulate in lake beds over the years. Spring snowmelt swells rivers dramatically, washing impressive quantities of material from the landscape into a lake. This means that proportionally more sand and silt is deposited early in the year. Wind and wave action keep the very finest of materials suspended in lake water through fall. Lake ice puts a lid on things
These seasonal differences in material settling onto lake floors appear as paler and darker stripes, called varves, in lake sediment cores. The cores yield a limited perspective, because each one samples just one point on the lake floor.
To get the bigger picture, geologist Patricia Manley, a professor at Middlebury College, and her long-time collaborator and husband, Tom Manley, broadcast “compressed high intensity radar pulses (CHIRPs) into the lake water and the sediment below.
Detectors record radar pulses bouncing from subsurface varves and use these to build three-dimensional, X-ray-like images of sediments laid down over centuries. These images can record sediment layers as far back as the end of the most recent ice age, and they suggest that tsunamis are part of Lake Champlain’s history.
Varves are not just monotonous layers of crud. Like tree rings, there’s quite a bit of variability from year to year. Melt from one year’s deeper snowpack may leave a thicker sandy layer. A year with little lake ice may obscure the clay layer.
Extended ice and reduced melt, as happened during 1816, the infamous year without a summer, would leave a unique signature with less deposition because of reduced river flows. All these basin-wide patterns combine to produce a barcodelike pattern of consistently varying relative
To the trained eye, departures from this barcode stand out. Manley and her collaborators noticed a particularly spectacular departure just south of the Bouquet River on the New York side of Lake Champlain. A dramatic upheaval was evident approximately 5,000 years back: a large swath of sediment was missing from a shallow slope. Above and below this gap in the record, there was a normal accumulation of older sediments. Manley found six such masses of displaced sediment, all in the same time frame.
To explain this mysterious dramatic movement of sediment, Manley looked deeper into Lake Champlain. There, she found that tons of sediment had gone downhill in catastrophic underwater mudslides that upended many decades of accumulated sediment, causing the historic barcode to read backways from older sediment down through younger varves that had been rolled under. Above the topsy-turvy misplaced sediment pile, additional centuries of sediment had accumulated in the normal way, encapsulating the record of the mudslide.
The wave would have been large enough to wash ashore on the eastern side of Lake Champlain more than 25 feet above the water line.
mi. According to Manley, the wave would have been large enough to wash ashore on the eastern side of Lake Champlain more than 25 feet above the water line. What might cause sediment that had sat quietly for a millennium to take flight suddenly and destructively? Manley suggests an earthquake was the likely culprit. While researching her findings, she found published records of above-water landslides in the Western Quebec Seismic Zone. The timing of these landslides matched up with that of the Lake Champlain mudslides. While tsunami risk is not going to keep me off Lake Champlain, I find it fascinating that forces beyond our current perception have shaped our lakes in ways I never would have guessed.
So much mud had cascaded downhill that Manley calculated the resulting pressure waves would have produced a tsuna-
Declan McCabe teaches biology at Saint Michael’s College. His book, “Turning Stones: Discovering the Life of Water” will be published by Down East Books in June and is available for pre-order. Illustration by Adelaide Murphy Tyrol. The Outside Story is assigned and edited by Northern Woodlands magazine and sponsored by the Wellborn Ecology Fund of the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation, nhcf.org.
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with hunters, trappers and anglers. While the governor currently appoints its 14 members, the bill would have added two new members appointed by the Legislature. All board members would have been required to meet a list of qualifications and participate in training.
Moreover, the bill would have made the Fish & Wildlife Board advisory and transferred power to the state’s Fish & Wildlife Department to make rules that govern hunting, trapping and fishing. It would have also banned the controversial practice of hunting coyotes with dogs.
Sims said the rural caucus did not take a formal position on the issue and that members from rural districts and more populous areas were hesitant to support the bill. The caucus heard from stakeholders who advocated for and against the bill, she said.
Representatives were “hearing loudly from a lot of constituents with lots of different diverse perspectives,” she said. “I think that’s my sense of why the bill didn’t move forward: that many members felt like they would be taking a vote on a bill that might divide their community.”
Sims also pointed to a process that had played out before the session. In response to two laws passed in 2022, the Fish & Wildlife Board created rules to govern trapping and hunting coyotes with dogs. When the Legislative Committee on Administrative Rules argued that the board’s
rules didn’t go far enough, the board approved them anyway. Then came S.258.
“I think we do our best work when everyone comes together and finds consensus and moves forward together,” Sims said. This time, the bill felt like a “reaction to frustration about the LCAR process and the rules,” she said.
“I don’t think it was the right bill at the right time,” she said, adding that she’s “committed to continuing to be a part of these conversations.”
Patti Komline, a lobbyist with Downs Rachlin Martin, represented the group Animal Wellness Action, which supported the bill. She said she’s worked on controversial issues, including gun control, but that this one got people particularly “fired up.”
“People told us they got a thousand emails, about equally split, both for it and against this bill,” Komline said. “And really, what legislators felt is, they didn’t want to go into an election cycle where they’re alienating half the people. There was no right vote to take on this.”
Sims is among the legislators who could face political implications. The Craftsbury Democrat recently entered a race for an open state Senate seat in rural Orleans County.
Lawmakers couldn’t simply split the bill and remove one part of it to make it more politically appealing, Komline said, because people were divided over both
of its major parts: the changes to the board and the ban on coyote hounding.
Before it faced opposition in the House, the bill saw a strong show of support in the Senate — but not at first. The original version called for an even split of hunters and non-hunters on the Fish & Wildlife board. When other senators expressed concern about that proposal, Sen. Chris Bray, D-Addison, the bill’s author, walked it back, adding the two legislative appointees to the board instead.
With that change, S.258 passed the Senate with enough votes to override a likely veto by Gov. Phil Scott. But after it moved to the House, it became stuck in its first committee, House Environment and Energy.
As the session approached its end, Rep. Amy Sheldon, D-Middlebury, who chairs the House committee, said the bill didn’t have the votes to override a veto in the House and that the committee had stopped taking testimony on it.
“We’re not going to move it if it doesn’t look like it has a future,” Sheldon said in an interview on May 1. Bray said he isn’t sure yet whether he’d take the issue up again in another session.
“I realized it was hard on my colleagues,” Bray said. “So, you know, I’m not going to jump back in without being really clear and intentional and have conversations with folks.”
For club rules and to join, visit the gmbc.com.
Saturday, June 1
Hinesburg Monkton Gravel Grinder: From Hinesburg on rolling gravel hills.
Meet at 9:15 a.m. at Hinesburg Park and Ride behind the town offices. The leader is Brian Howard, 802--304-0610, bjhowd@ gmail.com.
Sunday, June 2
Grand Isle Flats: One of the flattest rides of the season. 28-mile route circles Grand Isle. 73-mile ride visits St. Anne’s Shrine and a fossil bed.
Meet at 9:15 a.m. at Folsom School, South Hero. Leader is Dave Merchant, 802-825-3808, merchand59@gmail.com.
Saturday, June 8
Stone Walls and Solar Panels: 30-mile gravel ride from Underhill to Cambridge.
Meet at 8:45 a.m. at St Thomas Church of Underhill, 6 Green St.
Leader is Phyl Newbeck, 802-7347016, vtphyl72@gmail.com.
Sunday, June 9
Jaunt from Jasper Mine: 40or 60-mile rolling hill ride passes through Georgia and Milton before heading to St. Albans Bay for a break by the bay and over to Swanton.
Meet at 8:45 a.m. at Jasper Mine Road, off Route 2. The leader is Dave Merchant, 802-825-3808, merchand59@gmail.com.
Sunday, June 16
Hinesburg Hollow: Huntington via Hinesburg Hollow Road. 25and 47-mile options.
Meet at 8:45 a.m. at Williston Central School by the tennis courts. Leader is Tom Kennedy, 802-7355359, etomkennedy@gmail.com.
Saturday, June 22
Mostly Unpaved Ride No. 2: In the Charlotte area.
Meet at 9:15 a.m. at Charlotte Central School. William Regan, 571-730-8160, william. regan.802-@gmail.com.
Sunday, June 23
Way to Weybridge: 64-miles through rolling hills from Shelburne to Weybridge.
Meet at 8:45 a.m. at Shelburne Village Shopping Center. Allan Kunigis, 802-324-9958, akunigis@ gmail.com.
Saturday, June 29
Texas Hill and Duxbury loop: 43-mile gravel ride starts with a fairly big climb followed by a downhill out to Duxbury and North Road out to Waterbury.
Meet at 9:15 a.m. at either North Road turnaround or Iroquois Trucking on Mechanicsville Road. The leader is Brian Howard, 802-304-0610, bjhowd@gmail. com.
Sunday, June 30
Rouse’s Point Rouser: Mostly flat 50- and 60-mile loop. Returns by the ferry.
Meet at 8:45 a.m. at Grand Isle Ferry Parking Lot. The leader is Matt Kuivinen, 802-881-9045, mattkui@earthlink.net.
You could call Elise Berger a Swiss Army knife, a state champion — even Captain Chaos, the nickname she earned for her messy room as a kid. Now, as her time at Champlain Valley Union High School comes to end, you can call her Miss Basketball.
Berger took the crown this year as the best player in girls high school hoops in Vermont, as selected by the Burlington Free Press. The award came on the heels of a Division I championship over St. Johnsbury Academy this March, good for the team’s second title in a row.
“We all knew going into the season that this was going to be a grind,” Berger, who’s played organized basketball since the first grade, said. “It was cool that we had six seniors on the team that have been playing together for a really long time and that we were able to bring the team together, put in all that work and have it all pay off in the end.”
The 5-foot, 11-inch point guard averaged 8.5 points, 4.5 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 3.2 steals per game for the Redhawks this season en route to earning the program a
seventh Miss Basketball victory.
The senior and teammates also helped send 13-year head coach Ute Otley off to her new post leading Norwich University’s women’s team with a record 10th D-I win.
“She’s pretty much a coach’s dream,” Otley said. Berger was a four-year varsity player and a mature locker room presence who thrived in any role, she said.
Berger’s win comes at a time of unprecedented focus on the women’s college game and its recent superstars, like Caitlin Clark, Paige Bueckers and Angel Reese. Berger is all for the attention. “I think it’s really cool to see the growth women’s basketball has had,” she said. “It’s really cool to see that growth and it becoming a big national thing.”
Otley hopes those who tuned in to watch Clark play realized just how many women play the game “in a way that’s at such a high level that this is really entertaining to watch.”
Berger’s playstyle is far from Clark’s high-octane shooting from deep but commands a similar respect on the court. She’s “a floor leader who can advance the ball quickly, who knows how to create shots for her teammates and whose presence on the floor demands so
LAUREN READ CORRESPONDENT
Boys’ lacrosse
Middlebury 11, Champlain Valley 6: The Champlain Valley boys’ lacrosse team lost its first game of the season on Friday, falling to Middlebury 11-6.
Matias Williams led the way with four goals for the Redhawks, who were outscored 6-2 in the second half. Peter Gilliam and Asher Vaughn each had a goal for CVU.
Will Kearney made 13 saves in goal for CVU, which fell to 10-1.
Boys’ Ultimate
Champlain Valley 15, Middlebury 0: Champlain Valley remained undefeated in boys’ Ultimate with a win over Middlebury on Monday, May 20. Colby Morehouse scored four times for the Redhawks, who moved to 7-0. Jacob Lepple had four assists.
Quinn Bagnato, Nic Menard, Briam Simkins and Cedric Jenny each made a key defensive play for CVU.
much defensive attention that she can make the defense do what she wants to do to and create the kinds of shots she wants for her teammates,” Otley said.
She likes to attack the glass and do “the smaller things that set people up and get the team in good positions,” Berger said. Sometimes Otley had to remind Berger to look for her own shots, too.
Berger separates herself with her playmaking, Otley said. “We haven’t had a kid at her height who can handle the ball the way she can. She has a true pull-up jumper.”
“That combination of ball handling, size and midrange game made her a pretty unique athlete that we could use defensively a million different ways,” Otley said.
Her athletic singularity goes further: Berger is even better with a baseball in her hand. She not only pitches for her high school’s baseball team but has also twice been selected to pitch for the U.S. women’s national team, which she first made at 16 — the earliest age allowed.
“There definitely are some nerves, but it’s also really prideful, especially being from a small state
Girls’ tennis
Champlain Valley 7, North Country 0: The girls moved to 8-1 with a win over North Country on Monday.
Cassie Bastress, Sage Peterson, Addie Maurer, Leonie Schwetlck and Ella Lisle all won their singles matches.
Stella Makay and Maya Van der Els teamed up for one doubles win, while Millie Boardman and Riley Dunn got the other.
CVU also won Friday, May 17, beating Colchester 5-1 in a rain-shortened match.
Girls’ Ultimate
Champlain Valley 15, South Burlington 5: Ten different players found the scoresheet as Champlain Valley beat South Burlington on Monday in girls’ Ultimate.
Grace Thompson led the way with three scores and five assists, while Kaitlyn Jovell and Naveah Parrish each had a hat trick.
Zoey McNabb and Anna Garvey each tallied twice, while Abby Bunting and Greta Friesen both scored a goal and an assist. CVU moved to 7-2 with the win.
The loss comes after CVU fell
to Burlington, 11-10, on Saturday, May 18.
Parrish had four goals and two assists, while Thompson added two goals and four assists in the one-goal loss.
Champlain Valley 6, Essex 5 (8): Champlain Valley scored in the seventh to force extra innings then walked off with a 6-5 win over Essex Saturday.
Riley McDade drove in the tying run in the seventh inning on a ground out, and then Aaron LaRose hit a single in the bottom of the eighth that scored the winning run.
Travis Stroh got the win in relief, pitching two innings and giving up no hits and no runs. John Deyo went 2-for-4 with two RBIs, while Stroh added two doubles and an RBI.
The Redhawks moved to 10-1 with the win.
Essex 16, Champlain Valley 2: The Champlain Valley softball team found itself on the wrong side of 16-2 loss to Essex Saturday.
Mackenzie Yandow took the loss for the Redhawks, and Baylee Yandow went 2-for-4 with a double at the plate.
CVU fell to 3-8 with the loss.
Champlain Valley 13, Middlebury 4: Champlain Valley got balanced scoring and beat Middlebury 13-4 Friday afternoon in high school girls’ lacrosse.
Marlie Cartwright had three goals for the Redhawks (8-2), while Lulu Sarandos, Carly Strobeck and Stella Dooley each chipped in two.
Emerson Rice, Kate Boehmcke, Rose Bunting and Sophie Madden all added a goal for CVU, while Clare Stackpole-McGrath and Morgan Keach combined for the win in goal.
Champlain Valley 6, Colchester 1: Champlain Valley won its sixth match in a row on Friday, beating Colchester 6-1.
Jacob Graham, Dash Tota, Luke Sampson and Henry Frost each got a win in singles, while Nik Blaisius and Charlie Jennings and Sawyer Lake and Ben Fina won in doubles.
CVU moved to 7-2.
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type in keywords such as “abortion” and “clinic.” The ads direct people to the centers’ websites, he said.
The law calls for licensed, certified health care professionals to “conduct or to ensure that health care services, information, and counseling at the limited-services pregnancy services center are conducted in accordance with State law and professional standards of practice.”
Martin contended that the terms in this section of the law need further scrutiny, such as what constitutes “counseling” or “health care services.” He said that can’t happen if Sessions approves the state’s request to dismiss the case.
McLean responded that the state was disappointed that the centers took the state to court once the law was passed rather than work with officials and regulators to ensure their operations followed the law.
He acknowledged, too, that the state did not have a full understanding of the services that the centers provide because it was unclear when “medical services begin and when advocacy ends.”
McLean said that lawmakers’ goal with Act 15 was to take a proactive stance against potential misconduct by pregnancy centers in the future, not to restrict the operations of the existing facilities in the state.
“There is ample evidence of the problems that crisis pregnancy centers have created across the country,” he told the judge.
Attorneys representing the plaintiffs were joined in the courtroom by staff and board members of the two Vermont facilities, some of whom repeatedly shook their heads while McLean spoke to the judge.
Kevin Theriot, an attorney for Alliance Defending Freedom who was also on hand for the hearing, told reporters afterward that it would likely be at least a month before Sessions issued a ruling on the state’s motion to dismiss the case.
“The Legislature is targeting pregnancy centers, and they’re facing unjust punishment, just for providing free services to women,” Theriot said, adding that it is because the facilities “don’t agree with the radical pro-abortion views of the state of Vermont.”
In a memo to the selectboard advocating for the position change, Baker outlined the ballooning responsibilities that have made performing fire chief duties on a part-time basis increasingly untenable, including the addition of new full-time employees to manage, increased demand for fire and EMS services, grant writing, among other administrative tasks.
“All of these responsibilities rapidly consume and exceed the salaried 24 hours a week,” Baker wrote.
The town’s search for a new, full-time fire chief has already begun. According to a job listing posted on the town website on Monday, the town will be accepting applications through June 17. The annual salary range will be
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$79,000 to $86,000, depending on the candidate’s qualifications and experience.
Town manager Todd Odit said that the town hopes to fill the
continued from page 4
“Our worlds just not quite ready yet.”
Schwartz also brings extensive knowledge around the Camphill movement, an 80-yearold social change initiative dedicated to creating intentional living communities where individuals with developmental disabilities can have experiences working, living and building relationships with one another and the world
around them. The international movement has grown to include more than 100 communities across the world, and Riverflow is hoping to be added to that list.
“For someone like Jesse, people are everything,” Campbell said. “Relationships are all that matters to him.”
Aside from just providing stable housing, Riverflow will also implement rich daytime
The Town of Charlotte, Vermont (population 3,900) is seeking candidates for the position of Recreation Director.
The Recreation Director is responsible for managing Town of Charlotte sponsored recreational programs, recreation equipment and facilities to meet the needs of various age groups, in accordance with the Sports Program Mission Statement, and for managing the Charlotte Town Beach. The Director plans, implements, administers, coordinates, monitors and evaluates recreation programs for the Town. The Director further works in conjunction with the Recreation Commission in developing and proposing a budget to the Selectboard. The Town’s Recreation Department has budget of $150,000 for fiscal year 2024-25.
The Selectboard is seeking an individual with a collaborative and team-oriented approach; strong organizational skills; the ability to develop and work within a budget; and experience in developing, implementing and managing recreational programs. Candidates should also possess excellent communication, community engagement, organizational, problem-solving and leadership skills. A baccalaureate degree, or equivalent, in recreation or sports management or related fields is preferred. However, candidates with comparable work experience are highly encouraged to apply. A complete job description is available at https://charlottevt.org/jobs.
The salary range for the position is $43,500 - $48,500 DOQ. Working hours and duties will vary seasonally, averaging 30 hours/week. This position is eligible for health, dental and retirement benefits. Background check required. Charlotte is an EOE and values diversity and inclusiveness in the community and workplace. Email applications, including a cover letter and resumé, to townadmin@ townofcharlotte.com by May 31st, 2024. Applications submitted after this deadline may be accepted on a rolling basis. The Selectboard intends the selected candidate to start by July 15th, 2024.
position by the late July or early August.
“We’re looking for someone to carry on the work that Nick has done in improving the department, the department’s reputation, its ability to serve the community — someone who’s going to really be able to take the next step in addressing the call volume with decreasing volunteerism,” Odit said.
At last week’s selectboard meeting, Odit indicated that he had already encountered potential candidates, saying that there are “at least five people I know that are interested.”
According to Odit, Baker will stay on as chief until a replacement is found and has agreed to stay on to help with the transition.
programming with a variety of person-centered activities.
“Vermont has been, like many states, very good at including the children with intellectual developmental disabilities in the school, but once they graduate from school, there was virtually no programming, no day programming,” said Campbell.
Riverflow will accommodate four “friends,” or the founding residents, along with live-in staff and other volunteer positions.
“One of the people coming to Riverflow, they tried to access the shared living provider model, and he was rejected 17 times,” Schwartz said.
While the group has made a substantial amount of progress in renovations, there is still a hefty monetary need to bring their first guests into their new home in time to open in October. While simultaneously seeking state grants, the group plans to begin bigger public campaigns for funds in June.
Another way the community can help is to join a community workday by helping paint, scrape and plant. The next one is Saturday, June 8, from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m., 57 Cedar Lane in Monkton.
While this community stands as a large step in the right direction, Campbell and Schwartz are committed to continuing in policy work that looks to expand inclusive practices and services. Riverflow is just the beginning of that.
“There’s so much work ahead of us,” Schwartz said. “What is really nice is that Riverflow will have the opportunity to collaborate with that and really be a leader in how to do all that inclusive practice. We will be both a really alternative setting and we will also do policy change.”
agreement and that will be presented to both their board and to the selectboard,” town administrator Nate Bareham said. “They will come together to draft the preliminary list of modification agreements and from there, there could be some back and forth but ultimately the goal would be to have those decisions be finalized.”
Originally inked by the town and the service in 2014, the memorandum of agreement says the document should be reviewed every two years. The most current document is from 2019, but discussions about updating the agreement took place in May 2022 around the same time that the selectboard began considering a move to a municipal fire and rescue service.
Devine said at that same meeting. “Whether it’s the selectboard’s fault or CVFRS’s I have no idea, because I wasn’t here. I would urge us to get back into compliance with that as soon as possible.”
“I would urge us to get back into compliance with that as soon as possible.”
— Kelly Devine
It’s unclear whether those revisions were put on hold due to the pending changes.
During a budget meeting in January, Patrice Machavern, business operations manager with the department, said both sides recommended no changes to the agreement at the time the agreement came up for review, but the board did not take any official action at the time.
“I have a copy here that is actually marked up and dated 2022 that has a list of conditions on it including, I think, the existing one that it is supposed to be revisited every two years,” selectboard member Kelly
Talks of updating the agreement may be coming later than expected, but so is the supposed municipal fire and rescue service that the town anticipated would be in place by this time last year.
The board made a formal decision to halt the transition last June, citing other priorities. The board considered restarting talks last winter, but they didn’t happen.
At a meeting this week, selectboard chair Jim Faulkner said that the town is currently “still in discussions” over the matter.
To assist with the transition, in 2022 the selectboard approved paying $20,000 to consulting firm Ghallagher Flynn and Co. to help coordinate and facilitate a smooth transition from a private to municipal fire and rescue operation. Once the board postponed the transition, it also postponed work with the consultant.
RABIES BAIT continued from page 2
It is unclear how much the town has officially paid to the consulting firm so far, but Faulkner confirmed at that June meeting that the town had been paying “a monthly fee.”
Several requests made by The Citizen to former town administrator Dean Bloch, on
in August and again in October about how much the town had paid the consultant went unanswered.
Bareham, who took over for Bloch in November, also could not provide information on how much the town spent on consulting work.
A selectboard meeting last August included a brief review the consultant’s initial report that outlined uneasiness about the process on the part of the CVFRS, which said discussions about benefits and costs of moving to a municipally run service should take place at a warned selectboard meeting.
CVFRS also suggested, the report reads, that community members should be given
the opportunity to assess the town’s readiness to take on important responsibility of managing the service.
The firm also said that the rescue service prefers to report to a town manager, a role that doesn’t currently exist in the town since the vote to move to that form of government was defeated by voters on Town Meeting Day.
Because of these two things, neither CVFRS or the town could find common ground on how to proceed.
So for now, both Devine and Tenney will work with CVFRS to develop recommendations on how to update the memorandum of agreement.
The week-long bait drop is a cooperative effort between Vermont and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services to stop the spread of the potentially fatal disease.
Rabies is a deadly viral disease of the brain that infects mammals. It is most often seen in raccoons, skunks, foxes, and bats, but unvaccinated pets and livestock can also get rabies.The virus is spread through the bite of an infected animal or contact with its
saliva. If left untreated, rabies is almost always fatal in humans and animals. However, treatment with the rabies vaccine is nearly 100 percent effective when given soon after a person is bitten by a rabid animal.
So far this year, 23 animals in Vermont have tested positive for rabies, and 14 of those have been raccoons.
According to wildlife officials, rabid animals often show a change in their normal behavior, but you cannot tell whether an animal has rabies simply by looking at it. People should not touch or pick up wild animals or strays – even baby animals.
BERGER continued from page 10
like Vermont that a lot of people haven’t heard of outside of the U.S.,” she said. “Being able to show what we can do as a team is also really cool.”
Berger committed to play baseball for Bard College in October 2023. She has been in touch with current players and other commits, and excited to get to Bard and out on the field with them. “I was definitely looking for a school that had the academics and the intensity that I was looking for but also was a supportive place to play baseball,” she said. “Bard was the best mix of the two for me.”
Although she loves basketball, played soccer through middle school and dabbles in mountain biking, baseball “has always been the big thing,” said her mother, Elizabeth Berger.
At age 4, Elise would watch Lake Monster games start to finish, and growing up she’d drift asleep to the sound of baseball broadcasts, her parents remember. She made every school project she could baseball themed.
Berger’s father, Chris, is a California native and big fan of the Golden State Warriors and Cincinnati Reds. His love of sport spread to the young Berger, who, raised in Vermont, became a Red Sox fan — an infinitely better option, she’s quick to say, than choosing the Yankees. She stuck with the Warriors too for their dynastic run over the last decade.
miss basketball workouts because of national baseball team obligations. Otley had challenged Berger a few months prior to get faster and tighten her ball-handling, and she worried the young standout wouldn’t have time to do it, the coach recalled. But Berger came back that fall with improvement in every area Otley wanted, the coach said.
Heading into last summer, Otley challenged Berger to hone her three-point shooting. Once again, Berger came through, said her coach, meaning opponents in her senior season were forced to respect her shot and bring double teams out of the post.
That dedication to her craft was present even when Otley first met Berger when the latter was a fourth grader at a basketball camp. “I remember thinking that she was a serious little kid, very focused, very dialed in. She wasn’t there to goof around; she was there to learn,” Otley said.
“If I lose because I feel like I got outworked by somebody, that’s something that drives me to keep pushing and keep working harder.”
— Elise Berger“They’ve been super supportive of whatever I’ve wanted to do along the way,” Berger said of her parents. “Whichever teams I wanted to be on, whatever training I wanted to do, different tournaments we needed to go to — it was always, ‘We’re going to figure out a way to make this happen for you.’”
That doesn’t mean there haven’t been challenges along the way. She felt on the same level as boys throughout Little League, but as those male teammates got older, she worried she was falling behind. Those feelings continued into her first two years playing for the Bases Loaded Bulldogs, a local travel team she started playing for at 13. But by year three, feeling more trust from her team, she grew more confident. Her pitching improved.
“That year I think I grew comfortable in my role as a pitcher, understanding that I wasn’t necessarily going to keep up with them velocity-wise on the mound, but I had other aspects that made me a good pitcher,” she said.
It came down to work ethic. Berger said she’s driven by her competitive nature, hatred of losing and the collective euphoria of team success.
“If I lose because I feel like I got outworked by somebody, that’s something that drives me to keep pushing and keep working harder,” she said.
And it shows. Said her father: “She puts in hours every week on either strength work or specific conditioning work for her pitching muscles. Since middle school, it’s been pretty constant every week. She’s incredibly disciplined.”
In the summer of 2022, Berger had to
Berger’s mother recalled Elise’s baseball games: “I’m there cheering her on, and I’m like, ‘Hey, Elise, did you hear me cheer?’ and she says, ‘Nope, didn’t hear.’ She doesn’t notice anybody in the stands, she’s just focused on what she needs to do.”
But Berger isn’t always stone-faced. “Once you break under Berger’s shell, she definitely talks a lot,” said basketball teammate and fellow senior Samara Ashooh. “She’s a very funny person, and she’s always down to go out and have some random adventure. People say that she’s quiet and reserved, but I think she’s actually a very open and communicative person and always a good presence to be around.”
Berger’s mother called her daughter a “chatterbox” at home. The two like to cook together, and Berger loves showing off her 30-plus Spotify playlists filled with recent music finds — lately some country, classic rock and hip hop.
As Berger steps into the more competitive college game, her parents are confident she’ll be able to handle it.
“Our attitude for college baseball is the same as it’s been,” said her father. “We feel she can usually rise to the level she needs to and work as hard as she needs to be competitive, and we’ll see how it goes. She’s going to have to earn her playing time like anybody else.”
In the meantime, Berger said she appreciates the chance to give back to her community. She got invited to throw the first pitch on opening day this month for the Champlain Valley Little League, the same one she played in those years ago.
“I’ve been able to come back into my community and be a role model for younger girls,” she said. “When I was younger, I know I had role models that I aspired to be, and being able to go meet and play with some of them now has been huge. I hope that I get to be that person for some girls.”
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