A functional junction?

Transcription

Brattleboro, Vt.
Vol. III No. 6
June 2008
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NEWS
Actor,
author
decry play
closing
Program
helps build
girls’ selves,
community
page 14
Effects of legal
threats chill
theater company
VOICES
Injured owls,
VDay, HIV,
fiber optics,
and more
pages 16–25
THE ARTS
Gould’s new
novel on life
and writing
page 9
LIFE & WORK
Local history
right from
the source
in Putney
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page 12
By Caitlin Baucom
The Commons
STUART STROTHMAN/THE COMMONS
Frustrated motorists create their own traffic protocol as they drive through the confusing
intersection known locally as “Malfunction Junction.”
A functional junction?
Traffic-flow
alternatives
need work,
funding
By Stuart Strothman
The Commons
BRATTLEBORO—Drivers
seeking a bit of lawlessness need
look no farther than the intersection of Canal and Main streets at
the heart of town.
The Hinsdale Bridge, Vernon
Road, the Brattleboro Food Coop/Brookside Shopping Center
parking lot, and a transpor tation hub involving buses and a
train station all comprise the
large, chaotic patch of pavement
known by locals as “malfunction
DAVID SHAW/THE COMMONS
A pedestrian threads his way through a line of backed-up cars
at the intersection.
junction,” a site that defies standard traffic rules.
Building a Better Brattleboro,
the Traffic Safety Committee, the
Windham Regional Commission,
the Vermont and New Hampshire
Transpor tation Depar tments
have all considered this problem,
and various solutions await committee work and state or federal
funding.
Brattleboro resident Fred
Koch expressed concerns at
n see MALFUNCTION JUNCTION, page 4
Politics start to go nuclear
Both sides gear up
to court legislature
over relicensing
By Eesha Williams
The Commons
VERNON—For more than
three decades, the Vermont
Yankee nuclear power plant has
been the subject of public debate
throughout the state, especially
in Windham County.
In the past few years, several
towns passed Town Meeting
EESHA WILLIAMS/THE COMMONS
resolutions calling for the plant State Senate President Peter Shumlin says the legislature
to be closed when its operat- plans to raise the awareness about issues surrounding
ing license expires in 2012. The Vermont Yankee and its potential relicensing for Vermonters
n see nuclear politics, page 7
who live outside Windham County.
DUMMERSTON—Due
to the complaint of an audience member about the
role of an 18-year-old Brattleboro Union High School
student, the Vermont Theatre Company announced
to the cast and to the public after the first weekend
of per formances of Zeke
Hecker’s new musical, The
Lift, in early May that subsequent performances had
been cancelled
The cancellation was explained in only the most
cryptic terms. “Please do not
call for more information,”
the VTC’s Web site advises
visitors hungry for any sort
of explanation.
The complaint centered
around a scene involving
male lead Kario Pereira-Bailey, whose young character
of indeterminate age has a
sexual encounter with an
older woman.
Though the fiasco has
been widely reported locally
and as far as Boston, many
members of the company
have not yet publicly voiced
their opinions about the cancellation of the show. This
month, The Commons offers
some new and more detailed
perspective from both the
composer/author, Hecker, of
Guilford, and the female lead
of The Lift, Louise Krieger, of
Sunderland, Mass.
Though VTC is trying to
stage another production of
the play for fall — with an
older actor — Hecker says
the prospect “looks unlikely”
because of cast scheduling
conflicts. “Chances are, at
best, even for doing it in the
spring.”
“But we haven’t given up
on getting it back on the
boards,” he says.
Zeke Hecker:
Show now ‘buried
under scandal’
Hecker told The Commons he is “shocked and
depressed” about the series
n see play cancelled, page 8
2
The Commons • June 2008
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NEWS
The Commons • June 2008 Fire blackens the heart of Putney
Owners hope to rebuild
general store that operated
on site for 165 years
By Stuart Strothman
The Commons
PUTNEY—At 9:52 p.m. on
Saturday, May 3, the call came
in to the Putney Fire Depar tment: the Putney General Store
was ablaze.
“When the first two engines
got here we had fire showing
from the third floor end of the
building as well as along the peak
of the rooftop,” Chief Tom Goddard said. “There’s heavy water
damage to the second floor and
the first floor.”
Video of the blaze and the
demolition process have been
posted to the Internet. Watching the 1769 building, owned by
Erhan Oge and Tugce Okumus,
being cut apart on YouTube is
a somber activity for a Putney
resident. A general merchandise
store has existed for 165 years —
possibly the longest continuous
operation of a general store in
the state, up until the recent fire
— at the site in the heart of the
town center, at Main Street and
Kimball Hill.
At the turn of the century the
store was A.M. Corser’s, and
later S.L. Davis General Merchandise. The Fairchild family
bought it in 1974 and remade
it into a two-stor y operation,
essentially building it into the
landmark known as the Putney
General Store, an icon that has
long represented Vermont in images and advertisements. Now,
it’s a damaged, boarded-up building, waiting for reconstruction,
pending the owners’ decisions
and those of their insurer, Arcadia Insurance Co.
Oge expected the insurance
“may cover about half the inventory,” and as for the building, he
had no idea. He thought that in a
few weeks, they’d get estimates.
“I’d like to rebuild,” he said, “but
I know it’s going to suck a lot of
money.”
Oge said there was still no explanation for the fire; Goddard
said it was “not suspicious.” In a
turn of bad luck, a sprinkler system was recently installed, but
not in the attic where the fire
apparently started. Mitnik observed there was “definitely old
wiring in the building.”
Outpouring of support
In a post on the town Web site
iPutney.com, Town Manager
Chris Ryan reported “a great outpouring of volunteers, both with
hands-on construction abilities
as well as folks willing to lend
a hand with finding appropriate
grants and other tasks.”
“It seems that there is great
community support for the owners in their desire to rebuild,
with talk of fundraisers to help
the cause, if necessar y,” Ryan
wrote.
Oge noted, “I love the building; that’s why I bought it.” He
later added, “it doesn’t matter
who owns it—Putney needs that
store.”
Even before the fire, running
the business has not been easy.
Oge noted that between the gas
prices and bad winters, with little
snow and few tourists, many businesses have had a hard time.
“It’s hard when there’s a Price
Chopper, a Hannaford, and a
Wal-Mar t,” said Dan Mitnik,
who sold the business a little
over two years ago to Oge and
Okumus, who also run Putney
Village Pizza.
“I hope the General Store
comes back,” Mitnik said. “It’s
certainly the center of Putney —
a cultural and social hub.”
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Above: the
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Workers board up the Putney General Store several days after
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NEWS
4
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Left: Monroe Whitaker,
landscape architect.
complemented by strip construcAnother large change in transtion down Route 119 to Hinsdale, portation came in the early 1960s,
increasing traffic flow.
“when the U.S. Postal Ser vice
took the mail contract away from
A new vision for the river the railroads,” Carhart said.
When construction does ocA former diner which hung
cur, organizations like Building a over the Whetstone, off Bridge
Better Brattleboro (BaBB) hope Street, is now par t of the Rivthe current bridge will become a er view Restaurant, wher e
pedestrian bridge, bringing great Carhart eats every day. He noted
aesthetic improvements to the that he often walks down the
riverfront area.
tracks from his apar tment at
BaBB commissioned a plan- the Hooker-Dunham building on
ning study in 2004 to imagine Main Street to get there, as the
this change, to see the pavement “sidewalks have shrunk as a remass reduced, and to bring a sult of widening roadways.”
green space right down to the
He identifies “changing needs”
river so Brattleboro residents in the area of the intersection,
and visitors can enjoy the river which “have led to changing
views and access now unavail- approaches to address probable there.
lems.” The result has been a
In the early 1900s, prior to disarray of factors contributing
floods and construction of the to the current confusion in the
Vernon Dam, the bridge led to intersection.
Island Park, which spor ted a
In 2006, the town also acquired
baseball park and advertised it- proper ty along the river just
self as “the best dancing pavilion south of Bridge Street as a necin central New England,” with essary part of the Union Station
“300 balcony seats for spectators, Project, which will renovate the
and free parking for a thousand Amtrak station and give Brattlecars.”
boro the opportunity to re-create
Brattleboro resident Wayne a vibrant river front location.
Carhart offers a complex histori- The recent construction of the
cal perspective on the location, transportation center between
pointing out that the first train Flat and Elliot Streets, overseen
station came in 1848, but the cur- by Stevens and Associates, reprent station was built higher, in resents the first phase of this
1910, as automobiles demanded project.
more space for roads.
A 2007 report from architect
Michael Singer, “Imagining a
Riverfront Site,” commissioned
by Marlboro College and the
Brattleboro Ar ts Council and
supported by Entergy and the
Thompson Trust, states that $4
million in federal funding was
recently released for phase two,
including “improvements to the
Amtrak station.”
“When the bridge becomes
pedestrian and Bridge Street
is closed to through traffic, the
boundaries now existing will
disappear,” the repor t noted,
essentially reviving ideas from
previous studies. “The site will
become open to the town.”
The report’s “no-build” plan,
which seeks to avoid rather than
promote heavy construction,
features a green space, skateboard park, truck turnaround,
water treatment, and the historic
gas works building. The study
fur ther proposes “low build,”
“medium build,” and “high-build”
options.
The report notes that the more
modest proposals have received
stronger public support, though
some have expressed concerns
about “maintenance costs of
an additional public park” and
“whether passive on-site programming would simply create
another vacant space rather than
a vibrant center of activities.”
Funding questions
One small wrench in the plans
is that the federal funding, though
released, is on hold pending the
Town of Brattleboro’s audit by
the State of Vermont; during
this time, there is some concern
that the Federal Transit Administration may spend the money
elsewhere in the meantime.
Also, the Singer plans may
need adjustment to take into account the power lines that would
still travel right through the area;
the length of trains, which would
still block Bridge Street; and new
accessibility requirements for
people with disabilities.
Matt Mann, transpor tation
planner for the Windham Regional Commission, says the
“discussion of raising the platform for [Americans with
Disabilities Act] accessibility”
is a current topic, and that the
Singer plan “would have to adhere to that.” He is optimistic
the plans will likely be adjusted
in the near future.
NEWS
The Commons • June 2008 EE
S
N
VER
Brookside Plaza
(Brattleboro Food Co-op)
S
AIN
Kitchen and Baths
Shower and Steam Rooms
Fireplace and Stove Surrounds
C
AR
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QUALITY CRAFTMANSHIP SINCE 1925
H
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EWALD TILE AND TILEWORKS
Ceramic
Whetstone B
Moving the bridge?
One major potential change
involves plans for the Hinsdale
Bridge, heavily traf ficked by
people traveling to and from New
Hampshire, to be moved south
to connect to Vernon Street,
and thereby take a heavy traffic
load from Brattleboro’s commercial district. New Hampshire
owns the Connecticut River and
bears the financial responsibility for the aging bridge, which
needs replacement in addition
to relocation.
According to Brattleboro
engineer Bob Stevens, a joint
transportation committee of New
Hampshire and Brattleboro officials had a positive discussion
and achieved consensus on a design. This scenario would also
remove the train track from the
intersection, placing it underneath the new bridge.
But the considerable difficulties of the state of New
Hampshire’s priorities and limited funding for construction
projects mean this plan might
not be realized for many years.
Many bridges and roads in New
Hampshire require repair and
replacement.
In the meantime, some area
residents have speculated that
when Wal-Mart builds its new
“superstore” across the river, that
new construction will likely be
ET
E
TR
ST
OT
DEP
landscape architecture, and surveying firm, with funding from
sources including Fred Koch.
Its green space complements
the Brattleboro Museum and Art
Center, the train station, and the
Marlboro College Technology
Center, all on Vernon Street.
In thinking about the area,
Whitaker suggests that the impor tance of activities in this
location “needs to be given as
much consideration as the movement of cars.”
T
FLAT STREE
MAIN
2002-03 traffic safety meetings,
calling the intersection “ver y
dangerous for pedestrians.”
The intersection lacks any familiar traffic pattern — no traffic
signal, circle, or four-way stopsign structure helps drivers to
manage it. Moreover, a traffic
light two blocks north on Main
Street regularly backs up lines
of vehicles directly into the intersection and across the bridge.
White painted indicators on the
street are no longer visible, nor
are most of the 200-plus feet of
crosswalk.
The right turn from Vernon to
Bridge Street has a very difficult
angle, even for a passenger car,
and drivers making a left turn
from Brookside Plaza find their
line of sight obscured by the railing of the Kyle Gilber t (Main
Street) Bridge.
People turning left from the
bridge onto Canal Street or Vernon Street, depending on their
levels of daring, recklessness,
or impatience, nose their way
through oncoming Main Street
traffic haphazardly, like boats
in an overcrowded harbor, and
when a train comes through,
things really get jammed up.
One driver in a full-size pickup,
while recently attempting to turn
from Brookside Shopping Center, leaned out the window to
offer an opinion:
“They don’t call it malfunction
junction for nothing!”
A decade ago, the community
widely supported a roundabout
at the site, but these plans would
have had an impact on the “historic abutments” of the bridge,
and due to federal requirements
to preser ve historic sites, the
idea was scrapped.
The Plaza Park was restored
in 2005 under the direction of
landscape architect Monroe
Whitaker of SVE Associates, a
regional engineering, planning,
from page 1
Connecticut River
M o r e o v e r, M a n n u n d e r stands that the FTA and the
State of Vermont will likely give
a “green light” to Brattleboro to
spend the Union Station Project
money soon, though for ongoing specifics we should look
to the Brattleboro planning
commission.
Brattleboro Planning Commissioner Rod Francis, hired in
January, says “the audit requirements are being addressed by
the Town. It is expected that we
will hear from the FTA soon regarding the next phase of work,
and this will be work booked
against the following fiscal year’s
budget (FY09-10).”
According to both Stevens and
Whitaker, more green spaces by
the intersection itself would further allow easier snow removal,
better pedestrian crossing, and
greater aesthetics.
Stevens similarly suggests
that rethinking the intersection
gives “an opportunity to look at
other uses of the street besides
vehicular traffic. We want to accommodate cars, but really make
sure we’re providing for pedestrians, bikers, and transit.”
Another principal concern
regarding the intersection is
its large expanse of vehicular-accessible pavement in the
intersection, and the difficulty
with safe pedestrian traffic.
Over the past years, this issue
comes up repeatedly in the traffic safety committee minutes.
In November of 2002, during a
period of construction, barrels
and lights were placed on the
bridge to help protect pedestrians. In the summer of 2006,
during the Main Street Bridge
construction, a complex zigzag
of barrel-marked crosswalks
wove pedestrians through the
intersection, to the museum, or
the bridge.
‘Preferred plan’
The plan currently preferred
for the intersection by the town,
county, and state, involves two
coordinated traffic lights, one at
the intersection of Bridge Street
(Rte. 119) and Vernon Street
(Rte. 142), and one at Main Street
and Canal Street (Rte. 5). Whitaker speculates that there will
still be a good deal of backed-up
traffic with this arrangement-possibly more than we currently
have.
“That is the going plan, but
there is some wiggle-room,”
Mann said. “It is possible not
to install traffic lights.” He said
the traffic light project is “earmarked” by VTrans, meaning it
is fully funded by the state, rather
than requiring a 20-percent contribution from the town.
The project is combined with
two paving projects—one from
Exit 1 of Interstate 91 all the way
down Canal Street and up Main
Street to the West River, and separately, up Putney Road to the
Dummerston/Putney line.
Rod Francis met with VTrans
officials in mid-May, and hopes
to move ahead with this proposal,
described in detail in a 2001
report, “Main Street Reconstruction Project.”
“The state will pay for the installation of any traffic signals at
Malfunction Junction,” Francis
said. “VTrans is hopeful that the
work (if approved) will begin in
the Fall of 2010.
Francis said the town is involved in the current planning
process with VTrans, and “all
5
A sports utility vehicle cuts through the flow of traffic in the middle of Malfunction Junction.
parties are eager to see the best
outcome possible given the large
number of design constraints,
changing traf fic patterns and
the desire to improve pedestrian
and vehicle traffic safety while
further enhancing the charm of
downtown Brattleboro.”
Regarding the possible developments of Union Station and
the relocation of the bridge,
Mann believes that “if you go
with traffic signals, you’ll still be
able to include that long-range
planning.”
A different, low-tech suggestion by Whitaker that the town
could attempt before investing in
the potentially unattractive traffic signals involves a three-way
stop for Bridge, Main, and Canal
streets, with added green spaces,
and dominant routes given to the
turn from Canal to Vernon, a major truck thoroughfare, and down
Route 5, from Main to Canal.
Currently Vernon Street yields
to Bridge Street traffic.
Whitaker suggests that placing the stop sign on Bridge
Street before the pedestrian Street or into the Brookside
crossing will help that situation Plaza.
considerably.
Traffic accident ratios from the
intersection (.43 per million veThe traffic flow
hicles) are slightly higher than
Traffic volume reports from average (.39). The 2001 environ2000 show more than 500 vehi- mental assessment from Clough
cles traveling down Canal Street and Associates that cites these
into the intersection during the numbers suggests that the stopafternoon peak hour, and when lights would reduce accidents at
the study projected the effect of the intersection.
a new bridge to Hinsdale farther
Even with the three-way idea,
south along Route 142, it pro- drivers emerging from Brookjected marginally higher volumes side Plaza will still have turning
for the main thoroughfares, but difficulties.
radically different numbers for
Brattleboro Food Co-op ManVernon and Bridge Streets.
ager Alex Gyori repor ts that
For example, the study pro- the organization is considering
jected an increase of over 900 whether to renovate the current
percent in the number of vehi- building, or whether to construct
cles turning from Canal to Main at new location closer to the road,
during the evening peak hour, in what now serves as a parking
and a decrease of 2000 percent lot just to the left of the plaza
of traffic from Canal to Bridge entrance.
Street.
Either way, the Co-op, which
According to the 2000 report, owns the plaza, plans to keep
just over half (268) go up Main the access point to the intersecStreet, and just under half (225) tion, though as Gyori said, “this
cross the bridge, while the re- intersection needs to be immainder (58) turn down Vernon proved, or ‘fixed,’ because of the
flow — it’s pretty much a failed
intersection.”
The Brattleboro Food Co-op
board considered a different entrance across from South Main
Street, but the grade was too
high; Gyori said the business
would have to give up too much
parking lot area to the slope
they’d have to build. He said that
as good neighbors, to help take
much of the Plaza’s traffic burden
from the intersection, they would
be willing to consider vehicular
access across the Whetstone
Brook, from Flat Street.
Brattleboro residents who
would like to weigh in on these
issues can become involved in
the planning process, either to
discuss the stoplight option, or
to form, as the Singer repor t
recommends, a “Friends of the
Riverfront Committee,” to shepherd the process of developing
a vibrant water front site that
meets the needs of Brattleboro
residents.
9
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( )*+, -./-000 1 )***, *+2/2.++ '''33
# 145
6" $ NEWS
6
NEWS
The Commons • June 2008 Will there be enough money
to unbuild Vermont Yankee?
In the wake of the governor’s veto, a look at
the math behind the decommissioning fund
By Elizabeth G. Macalaster
The Commons
VERNON—Gover nor Jim
Douglas’s recent veto of a bill that
would have forced Vermont Yankee to add money to an account
whose funds will eventually be
used to pay for decommissioning
the nuclear power plant leaves
some Vermonters continuing to
question whether the plant will
have enough money on hand to
pay for the site’s cleanup.
The decommissioning fund
was started by Vermont Yankee
Nuclear Power Corporation in
1983, according to Rob Williams,
spokesperson for Entergy Corporation, which bought Vermont
Yankee in 2002.
At that time, ratepayers filled
the fund’s coffers, and when Entergy bought the plant in 2002,
the fund contained about $310
million. At the time, this amount
was deemed suf ficient by the
Nuclear Regulator y Commission (NRC), which requires that
companies set up decommissioning funds.
One of the sale conditions,
said Jim Mattheau, executive director of the Windham County
Regional Commission, was for
Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power
Corporation to top off the decommissioning fund so that Entergy
didn’t have to add more.
Today, about $425 million sits
in the fund, but the decommissioning will cost an estimated
$893 million in 2006 dollars, according to TLG Ser vices, Inc.,
a decommissioning cost and
planning ser vice company in
Bridgewater, Conn. which is
wholly owned by Entergy.
Williams said Entergy in the
past has reported the fund balance to the NRC ever y other
year, and since the plant is within
five years of decommissioning,
the federal agency requires annual notification. The plant’s
license will expire in 2012, but
in March Entergy filed a petition
with the Vermont Public Service Board (VPSB) seeking an
extension to let it produce power
at the plant through 2032.
“If the funds are not at the
appropriate level that the NRC
would like, then Vermont Yankee
will have to increase the funds,”
Williams said.
Lessons from the past?
Although Bob Young, president of Central Vermont Public
Ser vice, which buys and distributes power from the plan,
claimed there is “no risk that decommissioning costs will fall on
Vermont shoulders” in a recent
letter to the Reformer, others are
not so sure.
The decommissioning process of neighboring nuclear
power plants puts Vermont Yankee’s funding issues into some
context.
Costs for closing Yankee
Atomic in the wester n Massachusetts town of Rowe and
Connecticut Yankee in Haddam
Neck, Conn., totalled $750 million
and $850 million, respectively, according to Yankee Companies
spokesperson, Bob Capstick.
Decommissioning for both plants
was completed in 2007.
The funds, Capstick said,
were collected from ratepayers
through the Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission (FERC)
rate case process. These figures,
though, were much higher than
anticipated, said Deb Katz of
Citizens Awareness Network in
Shelburne Falls, Mass.
Katz said the Rowe plant,
which was one-third the size of
Vermont Yankee, started with
about $285 million in its decommissioning fund.
But things came up — such as
contamination and leaks — and
in the end costs rose to more
than $750 million.
Estimations for decommissioning Connecticut Yankee began
at $500 million, Katz added, but
soared past the $850 million estimate to $1.2 billion.
Both of these plants were
owned by utilities, so ratepayers paid the extra costs, with
Connecticut homeowners poised
to continue paying the costs of
finishing the cleanup at Connecticut Yankee until 2015.
Capstick said if additional
funds are needed to store spent
fuel beyond 2022 for Rowe and
2023 for the Connecticut plant,
the companies will return to
FERC and seek additional funds
through the owner companies,
Yankee Atomic Electric Company
and Connecticut Yankee Atomic
Power Company, respectively.
Nine New England utility companies share varying percentages
of ownership of the two respective companies: New England
Power Company, The Connecticut Light and Power Company,
Boston Edison Company, Central
Maine Power Company, Public
Service Company of New Hampshire, Western Massachusetts
Electric Company, Central Vermont Public Service Corporation,
and Cambridge Electric Light
Company. Commonwealth Electric Company owns a portion of
Yankee Atomic, and The United
Illuminating Company owns a
piece of Connecticut Yankee.
“There was no issue of the decommissioning costs not being
fully funded through the FERC
process, that I’m aware of,” Capstick added.
Entergy’s numbers
In a recent testimony to the
Vermont Public Service Board
— the state’s decision-making
authority in utility regulator y
cases — William A. Cloutier Jr.,
manager of decommissioning
ser vices at TLG Ser vices Inc.,
threw out more numbers and
posed more questions.
Cloutier, looking at multiple
scenarios, stated that if Vermont Yankee shuts down in
2032 the investments must yield
a 4.17-to-4.98-percent rate of return required for the funds to be
adequate.
For a 2012 shutdown, those
figures need to be between 5.47
and 8.85 percent, he said.
Cloutier testified that the fund
grew at “an after-tax annual rate
of 6.33 percent” from 2002 to
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Governor
Jim Douglas
vetoed the
decommissioning
fund bill,
claiming
it would
“unnecessarily
and substantially
increase the
future cost of
electricity on
both businesses
and families.”
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
A corporate spinoff
Vermont Yankee is the first nuclear power plant in America to
be owned by a private company,
said Representative Carolyn Partridge (D-Windham).
As such, ever y step of the
decommissioning moves the
process through unknown corporate territory.
One example that could have
an impact on the funding situation: Entergy’s proposal to spin
off Vermont Yankee to another
subsidiar y company, Enexus
Energy Corp., referenced in previous proposals as “NewCo.”
As if that weren’t enough of a
worr y, Enexus is highly leveraged — a company that will buy
Vermont Yankee, one of several
plants the new company would
own, with borrowed money.
Partridge said Enexus would
have only $700 million to cover
any accidents or other problems.
In an event where Enexus had to
bail out, Vermonters could find
themselves liable for millions
of dollars in decommissioning
costs.
One really important question
stands out from the rest. Who’s
going to watch out for the funds,
no matter who owns the plant
and whether or not it closes in
2012?
The veto and the
aftermath
Governor Douglas offered a
number of reasons for his veto of
bill S.373 which relate to the decommissioning funds. He stated
in the text of his veto that he opposes this legislation because
“it would unnecessarily and substantially increase the future cost
of electricity on both businesses
and families.”
“There is no doubt that increases in electricity costs slow
economic growth and impair job
creation,” the governor said.
Douglas supports adequate
funding for the total decommissioning of Vermont Yankee and
says existing procedures within
the regulator y system and the
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139 Main Street, Brattleboro 05301
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257-1299
quasi-judicial Public Ser vice
Board can monitor the fund. He
directed many of his objections
to the bill at what he characterized as the intrusion of the
General Assembly, resulting in
unnecessary duplication of time
and resources.
Douglas insisted that the VPSB
can do the job; the board has the
resources, staff and expertise to
evaluate Entergy’s restructuring,
including the funding issues,
he said.
The VPSB, as the regulator of
utilities, has weighed in on Vermont Yankee issues. In 2002, for
example, the VPSB ordered Vermont Yankee to be responsible
for the complete decommissioning of the plant.
If not enough money remains
in the fund at the time of decommissioning, the board has
permitted Vermont Yankee to
use a type of decommissioning method called SAFSTOR,
in which the plant would be effectively mothballed until the
funds grow to the point where
the facility can be permanently
decontaminated. Federal regulations allow up to 60 years for
that to happen.
Steve Wark, director of consumer affairs for the Vermont
Department of Public Ser vice,
a state agency that represents
the interests of Vermont ratepayers, calls SAFSTOR “a viable
option.”
“The decommissioning fund is
regulated by the NRC, so there
has to be enough money,” Wark
said. “If there’s not, then the decommissioning simply goes into
SAFSTOR.”
Decision by October
In July, the VPSB will hold
hearings about the transfer of
Vermont Yankee to Enexus
with a decision expected by
October.
The board has the ability to put
conditions on the transfer. For
example, Representative David
Deen (D-Putney) said the board
could require a contribution by
Entergy to bring the funds to
$800 million, before they issue a
certificate of public good.
Amid the muck of questions,
unknowns, and what-ifs, regarding Ver mont Yankee’s
decommissioning costs, Representative Richard Marek
pointed out one thing that remains clear.
“Everyone should agree that
Vermonters shouldn’t get stuck
with the final bill,” the Newfane
Democrat said.
VERMONT DEMOCRATIC PARTY
Democrat Gaye Symington, now a candidate for governor, has
not weighed in on whether Entergy should receive an extension
of the license to operate Vermont Yankee until 2032. Other
undecided elected officials include Republican Governor Jim
Douglas and Senate President Peter Shumlin; Symington’s
Progressive Party challenger Anthony Pollina says the plant
should close as scheduled in 2012.
n Nuclear politics
state legislature has spent countless hours passing laws relating
to Vermont Yankee. Dozens of
people have been arrested for
unlawful trespass at the plant’s
gates in Vernon, and at the Brattleboro office of Entergy Corp.,
the reactor’s Louisiana-based
owner.
The next year is likely to be
the most intense yet for the battle over the future of Vermont
Yankee.
In November, Republican Governor James Douglas, who told
The Commons the plant has been
“a cost-effective, emissions-free
source of energy for years,” will
face challengers Democrat Gaye
Symington, now speaker of the
Vermont House, and Anthony
Pollina, the Progressive Party
candidate.
The three-way contest makes
it likely that the left-of-center
vote will be split, letting Douglas win the popular vote despite
more people voting for other
candidates.
Such was the case in 2002,
Y
from page 1
when Pollina ran for lieutenant governor against Putney
Democrat Peter Shumlin, now
president of the state senate,
and Republican Brian Dubie. Pollina and Shumlin shared similar
views on major issues and got
a combined 56 percent of the
vote, but Dubie was elected with
a plurality.
Under the state constitution,
if none of the three candidates
for governor gets the majority of
votes, the Democrat-controlled
state legislature will choose the
next governor.
Z
January and is expected to conclude in May.
Because of the way Act 160
was written, the governor will
not be able to veto the legislature’s decision on whether to let
Yankee run after 2012, but the
results of the governor’s election will likely have an influence
on the reactor’s future.
Next year’s governor will appoint a member to a six-year
term on the three-member Public Service Board, a key forum
for deciding Vermont Yankee’s
future, when board member John
Burke’s term expires.
The Depar tment of Public
Ser vice, whose commissioner,
David O’Brien, is a Douglas appointee, “will weigh in before
the Public Service Board on the
relicensing,” Douglas told The
Commons. “I don’t want it to happen before the safety audit has
been done.”
Symington told The Commons
she has worked hard to protect
Vermonters’ interest in Vermont
Yankee. “Under my leadership,
we passed a law this year that
requires an independent audit
of the reliability of Vermont Yankee,” she said.
Shumlin said another result
of the recently ended legislative session will be to raise the
awareness of Vermonters who
live outside Windham County.
“That’s why Symington and I
ordered a study to be done this
year, with public hearings to be
held around the state, about the
best place to put the nuclear
waste which is now in the flood
plain of the Connecticut River
in Vernon. Burlington would be
one of the sites considered for
the nuclear waste dump.”
Lobbyists, citizens
gird for a fight
The Nuclear Energy Institute
does much of the industry’s lobbying and public relations work.
Its annual budget is $40 million,
and Entergy is the second biggest source of money for the
organization, said NEI spokesman Steve Kerekes, who believes
Vermont Yankee should be allowed to run after 2012.
Entergy employees have been
making their voices heard, including at a hearing of the Windham
Regional Commission in March,
where they showed up in force
to advocate keeping the plant
open. Pro-nuclear speakers at
the hearing spoke about jobs
that will be lost when Vermont
Yankee closes. Representatives
from several nonprofit organizations that get donations from
Entergy, added their support for
the license extension.
Paul Burns, director of the
state’s biggest environmental advocacy organization, the Vermont
Public Interest Research Group
(VPIRG), said the VY audit law
passed this year by the state legislature was “weak.”
Burns and Deb Katz of the
Citizens Awareness Network
(CAN), the most active of the
anti-nuclear groups based near
Vermont Yankee, both said the
chances are good that the reactor will close in 2012 if ordinary
people become active. Protests
preceded the shutdown of the
Shoreham, Yankee Atomic, Millstone I, Rancho Seco, and Maine
Yankee nuclear power plants.
Other local anti-nuclear groups
are the New England Coalition
on Nuclear Pollution and Nuclear
Free Vermont.
“People also need to speak
with Vermonters who live outside of Windham County about
why Vermont Yankee should be
closed,” longtime local activist
Daniel Sicken of Dummerston
said. “CAN is organizing people
to make phone calls and go doorto-door.”
Entergy has hired companies
to call Vermonters and give its
views on the relicensing. It has
also bought radio commercials
and full-page ads in newspapers
around the state.
Where they stand
In the meantime, lobbyists,
activists, and ordinary citizens
alike wait to learn where elected
officials stand on the relicensing issue.
In recent inter views with
The Commons, Pollina said Vermont Yankee should close in
2012, while Douglas, Symington, and Shumlin all said they
needed more information before
deciding.
“That’s really unacceptable,”
said Paul Burns. “There is more
than enough information available now for any candidate
for statewide of fice to decide
whether Vermont Yankee should
close in 2012.”
TOP of the HILL GRILL
“GENUINE PIT B-B-Q”
What’s at stake
Two years ago, the state legislature passed, and Douglas
signed, Act 160, which authorized the legislature to decide
whether Vermont Yankee can operate after 2012. If the legislature
does not vote on the matter by
2012, the reactor must close.
Lobbying is already heating
up in Montpelier in anticipation
of a vote during next year’s legislative session, which will start in
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April through October
8
The Arts
n Play cancelled
of events.
“Two years of work spoiled. If
you were a painter and somebody
slashed a canvas you’d worked
on… you can repaint it, but it
won’t be the same.
“The show is not the script and
songs, it’s ever ybody working
together. The production was
marvelous, beautifully sung and
acted, imaginatively staged. The
young actor, Kario Pereira-Bailey,
was ideally cast.”
Hecker also of fered some
more insight into the complainant, who “insisted on anonymity,”
and the nature of his or her
demands.
“The complaints were made in
person to the director, Bob Kramsky, and apparently involved
threats of [legal] action against
him and perhaps the company
unless he closed the show.
“It was Bob’s call, as VTC
board member and director. He
was in the hot seat. Also, VTC
has produced two of my previous shows. I didn’t want to see
them dragged through unpleasant proceedings.
“I assume the complainant was
seriously offended and acted conscientiously. But I also think he
or she was wrong to force the
cancellation by threats and intimidation while hiding behind
a cloak of anonymity, and that
we were not wrong to present
the show as we did with the actors we cast.
“If we thought there was something unethical about casting this
actor, we wouldn’t have done it.
Bob designed the staging of the
supposedly objectionable scene
to be discreet: no nudity, no
touching of sensitive body parts,
total darkness.
“[Pereira-Bailey] never gave
a sign that he felt coerced or
abused or uneasy; if he did, he’s
an even better actor than we
thought. I don’t know if anybody
has bothered to ask him since
this whole thing started. He is,
after all, an adult and can decide
these matters for himself.
“The complainant characterized the scene as a ‘rape.’
This astonishes me. Was there
Louise Krieger:
Coming to grips with
an ‘air of myster y’
Louise Krieger, the actor
who played opposite PereiraBailey, also responded to the
cancellation.
“I don’t believe the complaint
was warranted. However, the
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9
Young
characters
bare truths
from page 1
anybody else who thought that?
Not according to the responses
I’ve received, from judges and
ministers and doctors and
teachers. I’d call it a ‘mutual
seduction.’
As for the question of age, the
dialogue is intentionally ambiguous. When she asks her lover
how old he is, he hesitates and
says 20. He’s lying (although several audience members told me
they took his word for it). Other
details in the script suggest he’s
in his late teens. And remember,
we’re in Paris in 1890.
“The Lift itself is now buried
under the scandal, which is too
bad. People tell me that I should
enjoy the notoriety, and that it’s
good for the show. Well, I don’t,
and it isn’t. The piece is too fragile to bear all this weight.
“I appreciate the support and
encouragement I’ve received,
and I think the public discussion
of the issues raised by the cancellation is important. But I’d rather
have had the pleasure of sharing
those three more performances
with full houses.
Hecker says the effect of the
complaint on the play’s future
prospects goes even deeper.
“There’s no documentation,”
he says. “It was scheduled to be
taped at the second week’s performances. The complainant
refused to allow a taping with
no audience present. Without
documentation, it will be almost
impossible to interest other companies in the work.
“They say that when you fall
off a horse, you should get right
back on. But no production, no
horse,” Zecker says. “I’ve got five
more completed scripts ready to
be set to music. All they need is
an offer to produce them. Any
takers?”
THE ARTS
The Commons • June 2008 Gould moves from stage to
the page with Write Naked,
his first novel in 35 years
By Laurie Wheeler
The Commons
COURTESY ZEKE HECKER/VERMONT THEATRE COMPANY
The cast rehearses
The Lift: above,
Louise Krieger
as Helene; Kario
Pereira-Bailey as
Felix, and Tony
D. Grobe as the
Narrator. Right:
Krieger and PereiraBailey, whose
acting in a scene
performed in total
darkness prompted
a threat so strong
that the director
cancelled the show’s
remaining scheduled
performances.
complainant came to the theater with his or her own set of
experiences and biases, as well
as a psychological lens through
which he or she viewed the
show,” Krieger says.
Though she thinks the person making the complaint
“over reacted,” Krieger surmises the complainant “clearly
wields enough clout to make
our director even consider the
cancellation.”
“I believe that Bob Kramsky
responded to the complaint in
accordance with his conscience
and with the welfare of the actors and the company in mind,”
she says.
“From the beginning of rehearsals, we addressed not only
potential audience reaction, but
also each other’s reactions. The
original script was much racier
than what was finally agreed
upon and acted out.
“At each step of the rehearsal
process, we all took great care to
monitor each other’s mental comfort with the material as well as
to balance it with maintaining the
integrity of the story. We believed
we were doing ‘due diligence’;
we had no idea that one person’s
reaction would have such catastrophic results.”
Did Krieger hear any negative reactions from audience
members, other than the complainant, pertaining to the scene
that inspired the complaint? “Not
a single peep,” she says.
“Even my husband shared
with me that, although he was a
bit uncomfortable for the brief
‘scene,’ he was overwhelmingly
proud of me — and he enjoyed
the performances of the entire
cast immensely.
“The air of myster y surrounding the identity of the
complainant compounds the
devastation of the cancellation. It
negates the tremendous pride we
all felt in successfully premiering a new work of art — worse,
it hints that what we did is something shameful.
“The e-mail notifying us all of
the cancellation used the word
‘rape,’ presumably quoting the
complainant. As a woman, I take
that word seriously. Perhaps the
complainant does not view what
he or she has done as an act of
aggression and power (not passion), stealing from us that which
we valued, and leaving us with no
defense against a nameless, faceless assailant.
“It is the responsibility of a
show’s company (directors, actors, and crew) to interpret the
author’s vision, to tell the story
to the best of its ability. I don’t believe that the community at large
should be able to dictate what
happens in a performance, nor
should a theater company, while
mindful of what its community
will tolerate, always bend to the
larger community’s whims.
“Theatre should be used to
enter tain, to educate, to enlighten — which means that the
subject matter isn’t always going to be easy to present or to
view. Many companies, when
dealing with sensitive subject
matter, hold post-performance
‘talk-back’ sessions so that the
audience can have an interactive
discussion with the director and
actors about what they’ve just
witnessed.
“Many of what we now consider to be gr eat works of
literature, theater, and art were
considered shocking and were
banned when they were first
published, performed, or viewed.
There will always be critics, just
as there will, thankfully, always
be supporters.
“After all the work that I personally put into the role, I would
love to perform The Lift again,”
Krieger says. “However, the
specific cast and crew had everything to do with its success.
I imagine it won’t be easy to find
another “Felix” [Pereira-Bailey’s
character], but I hope that we
are able to give more people a
chance to see the show and judge
for themselves.”
“I sincerely hope that we are
able to revive The Lift so it will be
remembered more for its merits
than for the commotion caused
by a lone theatergoer.”
BRATTLEBORO—Two teens
coming of age, finding voice and
power in today’s world as they
contemplate the remnants of the
passion and tragedies of the sixties and seventies — that’s the
stuff of Peter Gould’s novel, Write
Naked, set in “2003 or 2004.”
Though the book, published
by Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
is classified as young-adult fiction, says the author, he wrote
the self-described “ecological,
anti-patriarchal novel” for ages
“16 to 99.”
“My novel is about two 16-yearolds, discovering love and
respect for each other in a log
cabin just south of Brattleboro,”
Gould says. “And it’s about an
old manual Royal typewriter,
and writing, and global warming,
and ultimately about teen-agers
confronting responsibility when
they are really attracted to each
other.”
He describes the teens, Victor
and Rose Anna, as quirky, wise,
and a bit outside the norms of
teenagerhood.
Gould describes Rose Anna
as a young woman with “a tremendous passion to confront
the issue of climate change,” and
he says she “just appeared” 30
pages into his manuscript: “She
said, ‘I’m funnier than he is. Put
me in.’ ”
Of self-professed “under the
radar” Victor, Gould says, “Everyone’s told me along the way,
‘You’ve got a good guy.’ ”
As the story goes, Victor wants
to test out the saying “You have
to be naked to write.” He sneaks
off to his uncle’s cabin deep in
the woods and begins to do just
that.
Victor soon meets Rose Anna,
described in the book’s publicity
as “a homeschooled free spirit
with an antique fountain pen and
a passion to save the planet,” and
the book chronicles their emerging connections to each other,
the environment, and the larger
world.
Deadline for news
and advertising
in the July issue
of The Commons:
Friday, June 20
Transforming
desire to art
Dressed like a summer day,
awash in blues, the curly-grayhaired, blue-eyed Gould is known
in the Brattleboro area for his
work with youth in the theater,
as a theater performer, director,
teacher of Spanish and Shakespeare, clown, and as half of
Gould & Stear ns, a physical
comedy act created with partner
Stephen Stearns for audiences
worldwide.
“I write to communicate just
like I do theater to communicate,” Gould says. “When I was
a teenager I was limited by my
stutter. I transformed my desire
to communicate into art. First
writing and clowning and then,
much later, theater.”
Gould received his bachelor’s
and doctorate from Brandeis University and studied mime and
clowning in Mexico.
In 1975, Gould wrote Burnt
Toast, “the first Vermont commune novel,” he says.
Gould describes himself as “an
original member of the back-tothe-land movement, coming here
in 1969 to farm communally.”
He lived and worked at Packer
Peter Gould and the Royal manual typewriter that appears in his new novel, Write Naked,
published this summer by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Corners Farm in Guilford for ten
years, where he wrote his first
novel, a book supplemented with
his own pen-and-ink drawings.
Gould says his activities during the 35 years between books
has improved his writing. “I think
I’ve become a better writer because of my theater work,” he
says. “I understand dialogue,
premise, escalation, payoff. The
same techniques in teaching kids
how to perform more powerful
theater.”
“I take their voices into my
brain, and really listen to what
they say and how they say it. I
believe I can write with a fairly
authentic teenage voice,” says
Gould of his book’s teenage
characters.
Not surprisingly, much of
Gould’s work is with teenagers.
He works with the Vermont Governor’s Institute of the Arts and
the New England Youth Theater,
1751 River Road, Dummerston, VT 05301-9665
(802) 257-5580
Breakfast 7–11
Lunch 11:30–3
Sunday Brunch 10:30–2:30
Dinner 5–9
Closed Mondays
P L E A S E C A L L F O R R E S E RVAT I O N S
and is founder of the Get Thee to
a Funnery Shakespeare summer
camps in northern Vermont.
The book, he says, is “ver y
close to the major theme of my
life, finding voice.”
As for the detail of the Royal
typewriter in the woods: to relieve writer’s block at one point,
Gould really did lug one to a
secluded cabin in souther n
Vermont.
And, well, the rest is his
story.
Gould will read publicly from
and sign copies of Write Naked
this summer; the first such event
will take place Wednesday, June
Gould says his novel is
4 at 7 p.m. at New England
intended for readers of all
Youth Theater, 100 Flat St.,
ages, including adults.
Brattleboro, where teen actors
will read from the novelw. For
more information, contact
him at (802) 257-4844 or
gould@sover.net.
10
CALENDAR
The Commons • June 2008 Calendar
at his magical Chosen Garden high on a
plateau in Putney. $5–$10 (sliding scale, no
one refused). 1 p.m. Information and registration (required): (802) 869-2141; info@
postoilsolutions.org.
S L IDE SHO W Travel to Western Tibet
with a slide show of a pilgrimage by Sally
Warren. In September 2007, five Vermonters travelling from Kathmandu to Lhasa to
Kailash to Kathmandu with a large group
of students of Tsok Nyi Rinpoche joined a
large group of Argentinians, Brits and Tibetans on a three-week pilgrimage to the
Sacred Mt. Kailash. This slide show of Tibet will include shots of Lhasa, the Western
plateau, the path around Mt. Kailash and a
group of joyful pilgrims. There will be time
for questions. 1 p.m. Free; donations welcome. C. X. Silver Gallery, 814 Western Ave.,
West Brattleboro.
Thursday, June 5
L E C TURE “How Does the Power of
Prayer Protect from Conflict and Violence?” Tim Myers, C.S., of La Canada
Flintridge, California, a member of the
Christian Science Board of Lectureship, to
address questions: What can you and I do
to help our world when daily violence seems
to threaten our society, and where conflicts
are spawning and escalating? How can we
resolve personal conflicts or violence which
may threaten our individual lives? 7 p.m.,
Brattleboro Town Common (rain location
at the church. First Church of Christ, Scientist, Brattleboro, 57 Putney Rd. Information:
802-254-4924; trevor@csmonitor.com.
Tuesday, June 24
Aksuat, a film from Kazakhstan by
Serik Aprimov (80 minutes, 1997), a tragic
farce, shows a grim look at the changing
modern times in relation to a traditional
Kazakh village and the plight of two brothers, one who stays in the village and the
other who becomes a social outcast in the
city. Adult situations mean that this film is
not for children. 6 p.m., Asian Cultural
Center of Vermont, 814 Western Ave., West
Brattleboro. Information: www.asianculturalcentervt.org.
FI L M
Friday, June 6
F e s t i v a l 7th Annual Strolling of the
Heifers. Festivities kick off on Galler y
Walk Night in downtown Brattleboro with
“Celebrating Women in Agriculture,” a
multimedia event at the Latchis Theater with
the Brattleboro Area Women’s Chorus. The
theme of this year’s agricultural celebration
is “Live Green!” To transform the public’s
concern about global climate change into
civic action, the weekend’s festivities will
focus on protecting the environment. Festivities through Sunday. Information: www.
strollingoftheheifers.org.
F e s t i v a l Roots on the River. World-
class roots music, free ample parking,
terrific food and drink at reasonable prices,
children’s activities, festival merchandise, a
musical equipment swap tent, the Sunday
street hockey game in an unbeatable four
days of music and entertainment. Noon:
Boccelli’s open mic; 4 p.m., farmers’ market;
open air show with The Lonesome Brothers and the Clayton Sabine Band; 7:30 p.m.,
Fred Eaglesmith & The Flying Squirrels,
The Bottle Rockets, The Lonesome Brothers. Under the big top in the field behind
Everyday Inn at Exit 6, Interstate 91, Bellows
Falls. $22; $20, advance. Family ticket package available. Information: (802) 463-9595;
www.rootsontheriver.com.
L I V E PERFORMAN C E Zabap, Brattle-
boro’s Afro-Caribbean jazz ensemble, plays a
free concert. Zabap’s music is highly improvisational jazz based in the deep traditions
of Martinique, Cuba, and Ghana. Strong
melodies on electric violin (Derrik Jordan),
trumpet (Dan Rostov), and piano (Eugene
Uman) combine with heavy grooves from
Jamie MacDonald (bass) and the band’s
trio of percussionists (Julian Gerstin, Steve
Ferraris, and Doug Raneri). 9 p.m., River
Garden, Main Street, Brattleboro.
ART OPENIN G Tamara Bolognani
and Ellen Graham. Bolognani’s photographic, highly detailed portrait paintings.
Graham’s new work includes mixed-media
sculptures with dark characters and eerie
creatures and paintings that illustrate an
imagined world for her creatures. Opening
5:30–9:30 p.m.; show on display through
June 25. Through The Music Gallery & Studio, 2 Elliot Street, Brattleboro. Information:
(802) 779-3188.
Saturday, June 7
F e s t i v a l Roots on the River, under
the Big Top. See description for Friday,
June 6. Fred Eaglesmith, Steve Forbert,
Eilen Jewell, Sarah Borges, Robbie Fulks,
Starline Rhythm Boys, Roger Marin,
George’s Back Pocket. Noon. $42; $40 advance; $10, ages 6-14; free, 5 and younger.
Under the big top in the field behind Everyday
Inn at Exit 6, Interstate 91, Bellows Falls.
$22; $20, advance. Family ticket package
available. Information: 802-463-9595; www.
rootsontheriver.com.
F e s t i v a l Strolling of the Heifers Pa-
rade. The stars — 100 flower-bedecked
bovine beauties — begin ambling up Main
Street. They will be followed by nationally
renowned entertainment, ranging from
bag pipers and baton twirlers to floats and
entertainers. Festivities through Sunday. Information: www.strollingoftheheifers.org.
RODEO Buckin’ Bull Celebrity Rodeo.
Youth Services presents a buckin’ bull rodeo
with a mechanical bull. Make a pledge to see
your favorite “celebrity” ride the bull. Noon
at the Brattleboro Common. Event follows
the Strolling of the Heifers parade. Infomration: www.youthservicesinc.org/rodeo.
L E C TURE James Howard Kunstler, au-
thor of The Geography of Nowhere and Home
from Nowhere will be speaking about his
latest book, The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of the Oil Age, Climate Change
and Other Converging Catastrophes of the
Twenty-first Century. Kunstler has long
been recognized as a fierce critic of suburban sprawl and the high costs associated
with an automobile-centric culture. 5 p.m.,
Marlboro College Graduate Center, 28 Vernon St. Brattleboro. Information: www.
marlboro.edu.
11
Wednesday,
June 25
T he Green Apple and A ffordable Green Housing. Sustainable
FI L MS
The Estey Organ Company complex in its heyday.
ROOTS ON THE RIVER
Estey Organ Museum opens June 29
By Laurie Wheeler
The Commons
BRATTLEBORO—A new addition from a century past, will
join the Brattleboro scene on
June 29, when the Estey Organ
Museum will open its doors after several years of planning.
The museum, in the Engine
House Gallery in the Estey Organ Company Factory complex
at 108 Birge St., will be open
from 1 to 5 p.m. that day, and a
tour of the factory buildings of
the former Estey Organ Company will take place at 2 p.m.
“We plan to create a worldclass interactive music museum
devoted to all things Estey,”
ART OPENIN G Karen Becker and
Friends. Becker says her paintings, photographs and pen and ink drawings “record
her delight with the visual world,” and that
her monoprints “delve into the meaning
below the surface image.” Opening reception, 9 a.m.–1 p.m. Crowell Gallery, Moore
Free Library, Newfane. Information: (802)
365-7948.
F e s t i v a l Roots on the River Festival.
Fred Eaglesmith & The Flying Squirrels;
Mary Gauthier. Noon. $27; $25, advance.
Rockingham Meeting House, Route 103,
Rockingham. Information: 802-463-9595;
www.rootsontheriver.com.
F e s t i v a l Strolling of the Heifers/
Windham County Area Far m Tour.
Check out southern Vermont’s scenic countryside as you wend your way around on this
self-guided expedition. Many farms will host
special activities for the public’s enjoyment.
10 a.m.–4 p.m. (Maps available at Chelsea
Royal Diner, West Brattleboro.)
L i v e p e r f o r m a n c e Music of Claire
Arenius. 3 p.m., Vermont Jazz Center, 72
Cotton Mill Hill, Studio 222, Brattleboro.
Information: www.vtjazz.org.
W o r k s h o p Poetr y and Jazz. Partici-
pants at the day-long workshop will work
with already-written poems and have a
chance to try them out in a jazz idiom. $75
to $125 (sliding scale). 10 a.m.–5 p.m.; evening reading, 7 p.m. Information: (802)
254-2442.
B o o k S a l e Seventh Annual Strolling
of the Heifers Book Sale. Sift through the
thousands of hardcover books, paperbacks,
DVDs, and audio books. Several boxes of
special coffee table books; a special personal
library donation of mainly nonfiction hardcover will be available. 9 a.m., early entry (8
a.m.) for members of Friends of the Library.
Information: (802) 254-5290, ext. 0.
Sunday, June 8
FESTI V A L Duan Wu Festival of China.
Learn the stor y of poet Qu Yuan and the
write museum organizers on
their Web site, esteyorganmuseum.org.
The museum will celebrate
the heritage of the Estey Organ Company, which created
reed, pipe, and electronic organs for churches and private
homes from the late 1800s to
the mid 1900s.
The Engine House, the first of
the museum’s planned exhibit
spaces, will introduce visitors to
museum planning, the history
of the Estey Organ Company,
the types of organs produced,
and tools and catalogs. An exhibit will also honor an Estey
employee, Harald Bode, who
pioneered electronic musical
instrument design.
The museum will “capture
Estey’s unique time in history,
from the point of view of Estey’s
owners, workers, customers,
and neighbors,” the site says.
The Estey Organ Museum
will include permanent exhibits of a variety of Estey organs,
Victorian parlors, and exhibits
that allow visitors to try out Estey organs; the museum will
offer a number of organ restoration classes.
“The museum we envision
will allow visitors to explore
and learn about music, social
histor y, craft industries, and
much more,” the group’s organizers write.
Duan Wu Festival and how zongzi dumplings came about. Make paper zongzi
ornaments with colorful silk thread and
mini paper dragon boats. Ages 9 to adult.
Free event; donations welcome. 1-4 pm, Asian
Cultural Center of Vermont, 814 Western
Ave., West Brattleboro. Information: www.
asianculturalcentervt.org.
information gathered. A list of sources helpful for Jewish genealogy research will also
be made available. 5:30 to 7 p.m. Brooks
Memorial Library, 224 Main St., Brattleboro. Information: (802) 254-5290, ext. 109;
www.brooks.lib.vt.us.
L I V E PERFORMAN C E Housetop, a
“four-part-harmony-singin’, swingin’ string
band, celebrates the release of Anna Patton’s solo CD Isadore’s Breakfast. $15; $12,
students and seniors. 7:30 p.m. at HookerDunham Theater & Gallery, 139 Main St.,
Brattleboro. Information and reservations:
(802) 254-9276.
ART OPENIN G Br yce LeVan Cush-
ing (a.k.a. MoonFire Tower) has moved
his sculpture and music operation to Putney, Vermont with his own galler y. He is
showing 27 pieces of his own sculpture,
his largest show to date and the paintings
of his long-time business partner Deirdre
Shinners (a.k.a. Grey Hutton) in this show,
“Fire Works.” 3 p.m. MoonFire’s Tower Information: (520) 609-8339. Monday, June 9
ART C L ASS Emphasis on Color Tem-
perature. Zena Robinson teaches artists
familiar with the basics of watercolor “the
inherent color temperature of pigments, the
changing temperatures of two or more pigments as they interact with each other, and
pigment choices to set a mood and level of
realism.” June 9, 16 and 21 at the United
Church, 8 School Street, Bellows Falls. $63;
$57, members. Saxtons River Art Guild. Information: (802) 463-9456.
G ENEAO L O G Y Discovering Your Jew-
ish Ancestr y Part 2 with Norma Cavey.
Depending on the needs of the class, possible topics of exploration will include:
forming a Jewish family ancestr y group;
Jewish family and given names; ethnicity,
race and DNA. Participants will also discover how to untie certain family myths.
There will also be a discussion of the problems of researching and understanding the
Wednesday,
June 11
B OO K DIS C USSION
Eisenhower,
by Stephen Ambrose. This series, part
of an ongoing discussion program leading
up to the 2008 Presidential election, combines biographies and histories of four of
our founding fathers, as well as four 20thcentury presidents post-WWII. Delve into
the lives and leadership of these influential
Americans. Led by Deborah L. Luskin. A
Vermont Humanities Council event hosted
by Brooks Memorial Library, 224 Main
St., Brattleboro. 7 p.m. Information: (802)
254-5290.
Thursday, June 12
B OO K SI G NIN G A Guide to Fiction
Set in Vermont for Children and Young
Adults. Meet author Ann McKinstry Micou
and learn about her new guide to Vermont’s
fiction. 6:30 p.m., Wardsboro Public Library,
170 Main St., Wardsboro. Information: (802)
896-6988.
C ON C ERT “Happy Faces and Hard
Knock Lives!” celebrates the 80th birthday
of Charles Strouse, with a review of his most
beloved songs from musicals such as Annie
and Bye Bye Birdie. A cross-generational
cast will bring the American composer’s
best-known hits and hidden song gems to
the stage. June 12, 13, 14 at 7:30 p.m.; June
15 at 3 p.m. $10, $8, student. New England
Youth Theater, 100 Flat St., Brattleboro. Information: (802) 246-6398, ext. 101; www.
neyt.org.
The Estey Organ Museum
organization has purchased the
Engine House and, as money is
raised for the project, the group
is planning to restore other
portions of the Estey factor y
for the museum’s full range of
exhibits.
The museum will be open
weekends from 1- 5 p.m.
through Sept. 30, and on Columbus Day weekend. Admission: $3 for the general public,
free to museum members.
Information: (802) 246-8366;
info@esteyorganmuseum.org.
Friday, June 13
W OR K SHOP Grieving and Letting
Go Healing Walk led by Supriya Shanti. Members of the walk will be led around the
Sanctuary path at the Manitou land. Opportunities for sharing and being silent witness
to others. Come dressed for a walk in the
woods. 4–6 p.m., Vermont Healing Tools
Project, 300 Sunset Lake Rd., Williamsville.
Information: (802) 579-4608.
ART DIS C USSION Peace masks slide
talk and artwork display. A Korean-born
Japanese artist and creator of the Peace
Mask Project, Myong Hee Kim will discuss and show images from workshops she
has led throughout the world, and display
masks created in Brattleboro by students
participating in the SIT Graduate Institute’s
Peacebuilding Program. 7:30 p.m. $4; $3,
seniors; $2, students; free, World Learning students, faculty, and staff. Brattleboro Museum
& Art Center, 10 Vernon St., Brattleboro.
Information: (802) 257-0124; info@brattleboromuseum.org.
Fred Eaglesmith will return to Roots on the River, the
annual world-class roots music festival at various locations
in Bellows Falls the weekend of June 6–8. Information:
rootsontheriver.org.
and the poor in the process. Sponsored by
Brooks Memorial Library and Brattleboroarea environmental organizations. 7 p.m.,
meeting room, Brooks Memorial Library,
224 Main St., Brattleboro. Information:
(802) 251-8135.
W o r k s h o p Homegrown Feed, Food,
and Fuel: Local Production for Local
Use with Netaka White, biofuels director at
Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund and former
executive director of Vermont Biofuels Association. Free; donations appreciated. Light
refreshments. 6 p.m. at the Marlboro College
Graduate Center. Post Oil Solutions. Information and reservations (recommended): (802)
869-2141; www.postoilsolutions.org.
W OR K SHOP “Identification and Usage
of Medicinal and Edible Weeds.” See
one of your favorite neighborhood wild areas through new eyes with Cindy Hebbard,
certified community herbalist and whole
health educator. Herb walks are informative strolls through a park, field, back yard,
woodland or nature preserve, even an empty
lot. We will positively identify several, possibly dozens, of medicinal and edible wild
plants. Participants will have the opportunity
to learn about a variety of nutritious, healing plants in a setting that’s sure to open
our hearts to the wisdom and magnificence
of nature. Noon–1:30 p.m. Brattleboro Food
Co-op, 2 Main St. $10 each or 2 for $15;
free for 12 and younger. Information: (603)
997-2222; www.wisdomofhealing.com.
Thursday, June 19
B OO K DIS C USSION Author Kay Abella
will tell the story of the writing of Fighting
Castro: A Love Story. What happens when
a Cuban doctor is imprisoned by Castro
as a resistance leader and his wife must
choose between helping her husband stay
alive and staying with her young children?
This dilemma is at the heart of the harrowing true saga of Lino and Emy Fernandez.
7–9 p.m., Brooks Memorial Library, 224
Main St., Brattleboro. Information: (802)
254-5290; www.kayabella.com.
Saturday, June 21
D o g T r a i n i n g “New Way of Look-
ing at Your Dog,” a natural dog training
workshop. 9 a.m.–6 p.m., Orvis Company,
Manchester. Information: www.naturaldogtraining.com; naturaldog@hotmail.com
W o r k s h o p Steps in home buying
process. Find out how to get a loan with
the most favorable terms for you. Meet local
professionals in the real estate field. Learn
about budgeting, credit reports and scores,
and affordable ownership programs. A $50
fee covers the cost of a textbook and a merged
credit report. The fee is refundable when you
purchase a home. Windham Housing Trust
& NeighborWorks HomeOwnership Center of
Southern Vermont, 68 Birge St., Brattleboro.
Information and registration (required):
(802) 246-2102; mgaier@windhamhousingtrust.org.
Sunday, June 22
W o r k s h o p Garden basics. Robert
King, Post Oil Solutions’ “garden guiding
light,” will present information about garden
basics from tools to pest control and more
Choices Film Series continues with two
short films. The Green Apple explores some
of Manhattan’s most prominent and technologically advanced structures like One
Bryant Park and The Solaire, as well as the
innovative minds behind them. Affordable
Green Housing shows how New York’s diversity isn’t always reflected in its public
housing developments, which often ignore
the social and cultural characteristics of the
communities who live in them. Organized by
Brooks Memorial Library and Brattleboroarea environmental organizations. 7 p.m.,
meeting room, Brooks Memorial Library,
224 Main St., Brattleboro. Information:
(802)251-8135.
W OR K SHOP “Preparing Healing
Foods,” a two-part class with Cindy Hebbard, certified community herbalist and
whole health educator, covers the preparation of nutritious and healing foods from
around the world. Learn about the nutritional values of super foods that research
has shown to support digestion, the immune
system, utilization of nutrients, detoxification, and overall health. Each week, we’ll
prepare healing meals ideal for families on
the go using a variety of vegetables, grains,
beans and condiments. $25 materials fee.
June 25 and July 2, 6–8:45 p.m. Community room, Brattleboro Savings and Loan,
221 Main St., Brattleboro. Information and
registration (required by noon on the day of
the class): (603) 997-2222; www.wisdomofhealing.com.
Thursday, June 26
TA L K “The Changing Life of the Cuban
Farmer” with Dan MacArthur, a founder
of the Vermont-Cuba Solidarity Committee
and frequent traveller to Cuba, who will
discuss his trip to Cuba in March, show
photos, and talk about recent trends in Cuban agriculture. MacArthur in recent years
has brought antique auto parts and bicycles
to this island nation. 7–9 p.m., main room,
Brooks Memorial Library, 224 Main St.,
Brattleboro. Information: (802) 254-5290;
www.brooks.lib.vt.us.
Mon-Th 9-5, Fri 9-6, Sat 9-4 Sun 10-3
32 The Square
Bellows Falls, Vermont
(802) 463-9404
vsbooks@sover.net
Free WIFI in the cafe
Show this ad for 10% off
your first book purchase!
www.villagesquarebooks.com
Check out our website — it’s filled with
event info & book suggestions!
Farming Connections Inc.
A non-profit organization in Guilford, VT
offering animal-mediated
behavioral health services
802-522-4575
info@farmingconnections.org
www.farmingconnections.org
Cultivating compassion and respec t for all
NEW ENGLAND
SENIOR INSURANCE GROUP
Vermont’s #1 Source
for Long Term Care Insurance
Hats Off, the annual cavalcade
of comedy, song and dance featuring “musical acts fitted to our newly rigged historical
painted stage scenery.” $4; $3, student. 7:30
p.m. Leland and Gray Players, Leland &
Gray Union High School, Route 30, Townshend. Through June 14. Information: (802)
365-7355; verbatim@svcable.net.
RE V UE
• Serving Vermonters for 16 years with
12 companies to select from
Wednesday,
June 18th
t "MMQMBOTQSPWJEFJOIPNFDPWFSBHF
Har vest ing t he W ind and
Energy for a Developing World. SusFilm
tainable Choices Film Series continues with
two short films. Harvesting the Wind shows
wind energy to be a burgeoning source of
local power and income for farmers in southwest Minnesota. The second film profiles
the Grameen Shakti organization in Bangladesh, founded by Nobel Peace Prize-winner
Muhammad Yunus, which distributes small
solar systems and portable bio-gas systems
to rural Bangladeshis, empowering women
Serving Green
Mountain Coffee
& Republic of Tea
Full service
independent bookstore —
a great place to browse!
Special areas: Children's,
Young Adult & Teen
Sections, plus Toys &
American Girl clothes &
books; Poetry, Writing &
Arts & Crafts area.
t 'SFFDPNQBSJTPORVPUFT
STROLLING OF THE HEIFERS
The Strolling of the Heifers kicks annual celebration includes the parade on Saturday,
June 7. See listings for June 6–8 for more events and a full schedule at www.
strollingoftheheifers.org.
t (VBSBOUFFEUPmOEMPXFTUSBUFT
1-800-325-9879
XXXMUDCFOFmUTOFU
12
Life & Work
D
Putney project preserves
the town’s history through
interviews with its citizens
The Commons
PUTNEY—Who knows what
stories lurk in the minds and
hearts of experienced Putney
townsfolk?
Too few, it seems — but not
for long. In Putney, a group has
formed to gather the collective
stor y of the town, in a sustainable way.
Many agree that oral history
collection is one of the most important roles that conscientious
citizens can play in establishing a
deep understanding of the place
where they live.
Organizations like the Vermont
Historical Society, the Vermont
Folklife Center, Strolling of the
Heifers, Flow of Histor y, and
Place-Based Landscape Analysis and Community Education
(PLACE) have made a strong
effort to connect the story of the
land with the people who have
lived here.
PLACE, a partnership between
the University of Vermont and
Shelburne Farms, promotes “a
sustainable relationship between
communities and their local landscapes by engaging residents in
exploring, understanding, honoring and celebrating the natural
and cultural features that contribute to their town’s character.”
In the fall of 2006, a year-long
PLACE grant let a number of
Putney residents, including
Paul LeVasseur and Meredith
Wade, join PLACE investigator
and trainer Claire Dacey to research the town’s geography and
agriculture.
LeVasseur hatched the idea
of an ongoing project in which
volunteers committed to gathering one oral history per year.
The idea received strong support from Dacey and Wade, an
educator with an interest in oral
history. The three connected the
Putney Historical Society and a
number of other residents, and
established the Putney Stories
Project.
Dacey, whose Putney PLACE
presentations would regularly
draw more than 100 townsfolk,
trained the Stories group in the
use of a Marantz digital recorder,
and through LeVasseur’s efforts,
Chittenden Bank contributed
$300 toward purchase of the
equipment. The historical society board voted to contribute the
balance, and Wade recently made
the purchase.
While the machine is officially
owned by the historical society,
all Putney Stories participants
are invited to use it as regularly
as they like.
Leaders of the Stories Project
have begun to gather oral histories. Wade interviewed longtime
resident and farmer Ramona
Lawrence, while LeVasseur
spoke with Ellie Lascore, a waitress at the Putney Diner whose
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Volunteers with the Putney Stories project have interviewed William H. Darrow Jr., above, of
Green Mountain Orchards, and longtime resident and farmer Ramona Lawrence, below.
ascerbic wit and a perfect memory — she never used a notepad
— brought her local fame, recently earning her the award of
Putney Person of the Year.
“A lot of times I say things
and they laugh it off, and I hope
they don’t think I’m being mean,
because I’m not. It’s just me,”
Lascore told LeVasseur in recalling her interaction with her
customers.
Lascore described her policies
about getting water for multiple
people at the same table: all at
once.
“But when they ask me to
make fifteen trips its, no, I’m too
old! That’s what I tell ‘em. I’m too
old and fragile. They just laugh,”
she recounted.
“I’m lucky,” she said. “I get
away with a lot more than a lot
of other people do.”
Others inter viewed include
Putney Morris Men founder Fred
Breunig and William H. Darrow
Jr. of Green Mountain Orchards,
whose father was a close friend
of former Vermont Governor
and U.S. Senator George Aiken.
Gladys (Braley) Miller and Marilyn (Austin) Loomis have also
agreed to interviews.
Many other Putney citizens
have signed on to the commitment to gather at least one story
per year. In April, the program
brought a workshop by civil
rights activist, director, playwright and actor John O’Neal
designed to “involve participants
in the collection and telling of
stories connected to the diverse
histories, experiences and perspectives of people living in or
around a particular town,” according to an announcement of
the event.
O’Neal’s workshop also
came to Brattleboro and to Bellows Falls as par t of Putney’s
Sandglass Theater’s “Voices of
Community” project.
our small Vermont towns are notable, and they connect with the
geography to create what author
William Least Heat-Moon has
called a “deep map.”
The transition of the town of
Putney from its early economy
of agriculture and mills, through
factories and then to the establishment of numerous schools,
and educators as a primary workforce, is documented through the
fifty-plus accounts in the Putney
Historical Society’s collection,
recently indexed by volunteer
Marion Schlefer.
One perspective on change is
offered by Bill Darrow:
“My boys claim that I farmed
in the golden age of apple growing, and apple growing has been
very, very tough since sometime
in the 90s…a lot of people went
out of business and had a hard
time. My sons’ response was to
just abandon a couple blocks,
and cut them down, and goodness we’ve got over a hundred
cord of apple wood for sale now.
I think the apple business will
Documenting change
straighten out right; it always
in the ‘deep map’
goes along like this. (He made
Over the years, the changes in an up and down, wave motion
13
Obsessing over living in Vermont Yankee’s shadow
In their
own words
By Stuart Strothman
LIFE & WORK
The Commons • June 2008 STUART STROTHMAN/THE COMMONS
with his arm). We’ve just been
through a ten-year depressed
period…
“We’ve seen a much more
educated, ar ticulate group of
people move in. We used to be
the new people…now we’re considered the old people in town.
That’s been a big change, and a
change to the best…you can get
through things at Town Meeting
that you could never consider
before. [The population change
has] made Putney a much more
interesting place to live, with interesting people, and very nice.
[My neighbor] Dr. Bookwalter was saying, ‘I’m so lucky to
practice here. I work in a nice
hospital; it’s well-run, and I zip
back home in my car—it’s a nice
place, and I live out here in the
country like this! I can’t imagine
anything better.”
Though opinions vary, it is the
patchwork that makes the quilt,
and the Putney Stories Project
should help with the sewing.
Reporter Stuart Strothman is
also president of the Putney Historical Society and participates
in the Putney Stories project.
Dummerston
ear Mary Ellen: I
felt somewhat relieved when I
learned that at the April
Yankee Atomic emergency
evacuation drill, a vehicle
would be sent to transport
people who live at the facility where my father has
been living for some time.
But now I have learned that
the transportation vehicle
never arrived. If this had
been a real emergency, what
would have happened to my
father and the other people
who live there?
What am I to think? Were
there other people who were
supposed to be transported
that didn’t get picked up
either?
The nuclear reactor has
been there for over 35
years. It’s getting old, and
we still don’t have a workable evacuation plan. And
now they want to run it for
20 more years! How can I
be assured that in the event
of a general emergency at
the reactor, my father and
others like him will be
transported out of the area?
I find that I am spending a lot of time obsessing
about this issue — time
that I would rather spend
thinking about more positive things. What can I do?
—Frustrated
Dear Frustrated: This is a
difficult issue. Many of us are
finding that circumstances
that are seemingly beyond our
important to understand that
this may be a frustrating process, that it may take more time
than you have, that things that
seem reasonable to you do not
Commonsense
seem reasonable to others, and
that politics that are hard to understand may be involved.
control are taking over our lives,
If you are going to get inthings like global warming, the
volved, I suggest you set up
Iraq war, the economy, and the
some personal boundaries about
upcoming elections. We all have how much time and attention
options about what we can do
you can give to this issue. Being
about these important issues.
an activist can be overwhelmFirst, we have the option of deing, and you may find that you
ciding there is nothing we can
are even more anxious than you
do about an issue and doing the were before you began workbest we can to put it out of our
ing on this issue. You may find it
mind. We may be too busy with
helpful to establish limits about
aging parents, a young family,
how much time you can spend
work, and compelling interests
— say, three hours a week, or
to take on an issue. But that
one or two meetings a week.
doesn’t mean that it is easy to do You could limit how many letwhen newspapers and television ters you will write or how many
remind us every day.
contacts you will make. I sugIt will take some time and
gest keeping these boundaries
some concerted effort. You will flexible so that, if this issue gets
notice that, over time, the issue
a lot of attention, such as after a
will fade into the background as failed drill, you can step up your
you do the things you normally
involvement for a time without
do day to day. If it continues to
guilt.
haunt you, you might want to
If you decide to become an
see a counselor or develop a re- activist, I would suggest some
laxation or meditation regime.
or all of the following strategies.
And you might want to spend
They may also serve as a guide
more time doing things that
if there are other issues you de“feed your soul” like walking in
cide to take on.
the woods, painting, or listening
First, study the issue. Request
to music.
a copy of the current evacuaAnother option is deciding
tion plan from your town office.
that this is an issue you want to
Study it so you know it well.
take on, that your anxiety is not
Talk with officials. Talk with
going to be relieved until you
activists. Develop your own opinfeel that you are doing someion. Decide what your goal is
thing about the issue.
in all of this. Are you just workIf you decide to do this, it is
ing to see that your father is
mary
ellen
copeland
evacuated safely? Or are there
other aspects of emergency
evacuation and nuclear power
that you want to work on?
As you study about this issue, you may see that given the
current state of evacuation planning, you cannot be assured
that your father and others like
him will be transported out of
the area if there is a general
emergency at the Entergy Nuclear reactor. This is a horrific
situation to contemplate: some
people being left behind, while
others rush to safety. We all
remember what happened in
Hurricane Katrina.
Know that you are not alone.
Other people share your frustration. After the meltdown at
Three Mile Island, every reactor
in the country was required to
have an evacuation plan. Now, so
many years later, and with a better understanding of what can
and might happen from 9/11,
Chernobyl, and other catastrophes, we realize that we do not
have a workable plan — far from
it. Every drill, rather than reassuring us, exposes more and
more problems. This horrible
situation might someday result
in a massive tragedy.
Some people who work on
this and other issues do it on
their own. They set their own
agendas and keep plugging
away. You might want to contact your local, regional state,
and federal elected officials and
agencies with your concerns.
You can contribute to the public
debate with letters to the editor of this newspaper and other
media. You can ask your family
members, friends and neighbors
to do these same things.
Or you can join the ranks of
activists who continue to pressure local, regional, and state
officials to develop a plan that
works now or shut the reactor
down. They need all the help
they can get. You have your
choice of organizations in the
area that would welcome your
participation.
No matter what you do,
whether it is just one or two
things over time, or immersing yourself in the issue, keep in
mind that it is all of us working
together that will eventually resolve these issues.
Working on such issues may
feel hopeless. Sometimes you
may work on it more intensively.
At other times you will see that
it is in your best interest to pull
back for a time and take care
n
of yourself. Mary Ellen Copeland, a
national mental health educator and author of mental
health recovery resources,
will answer questions through
this column. Responses are
not a substitute for treatment,
professional consultation,
exceptional self-care, and support from family and friends.
Address questions to Common
Sense, c/o The Commons, P.O.
Box 1212, Brattleboro, VT
05302. E-mail questions to
info@commonsnews.org.
14
Centerpiece
On the
Photos courtesy of
Nancy Heydinger
Run
The Commons
BRATTLEBORO—Coaches,
community members and volunteers, and girls in grades 3-8
from 30 schools in southern
Vermont — 1,000 all told — participated in what Girls on the
Run Executive Director Nancy
Heydinger describes as “a beautiful and incredibly inspiring and
rewarding 5K event” May 17 for
the Girls on the Run 5K Community Fitness Celebration.
The glorious Saturday race
was the culminating event for
Girls on the Run, a 10-week
course that combines athletic
training and lessons in self-esteem and self-confidence for
girls in grades 3-5. Its sister program, Girls on Track, ser ves
girls in grades 6-8.
With more than 2,000 girls
participating at 92 sites throughout Vermont, Girls on the Run
Vermont continues to provide
“positive, healthy, and non-competitive” programs for girls who
are 8 to 13 years old, Nancy Heydinger says.
The girls followed a figureeight course beginning at
Brattleboro Union High School,
along Fairground Road, South
Main Street, Oak Grove Avenue,
Sunny Acres Road and Atwood
Street and ended up back at the
high school.
“The girls crossed the finish
line beaming with pride and
excitement,” Heydinger recounts. “Next, they rushed to
the sidelines to cheer on their
teammates … knowing a bowl
of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream was
in their near future!”
regarding certain topics” like
eating disorders, tobacco and alcohol use, personal and Internet
safety, and harassment, according to information on the site.
Bailey says the program
catches the girls at a young
enough age “where the girls are
still receptive to adults’ influence
to help them with these skills.”
“Every year I wonder, ‘Is this
sinking in?’ I see the girls as they
get older, and they respond really positively. To be another
positive adult influence. It’s just
a blast. We’re getting them outside, teaching them about fitness
and teamwork, not competing,”
Bailey says.
Heydinger says the program
is open to all girls, “regardless
of their athletic ability or socioeconomic standing.”
Parents pay $60 of the $100
cost to put each girl through the
program. A scholarship program
also ensures that no girl is ever
turned away. The program is
funded through grants, program
fees, and fundraising.
Thinking outside
the girl box
Girls on the Run Vermont
is par t of a national program
founded in 1996 by Molly Barker,
a counselor, social worker, and
teacher in Charlotte, N.C. The
national organization ser ves
more than 50,000 girls ever y
year.
The program serves girls before they reach what Barker has
described as the “‘girl box’ —
that place where society, peers,
even parents inadvertently direct
so many girls, a place where they
think they are judged on a superficial level only.”
In its nine years Girls on the
Run Vermont has taken root.
“The girls, they’re perfect the
way they are,” says Heydinger,
who won the Community People
Award in 2006 with her husband,
Tom, for their work with the
program.
“So many women are coaching, helping girls to be stronger,
to stand up for themselves. You
can take risks in Girls on the
Run,” she says.
Program teaches
values, teamwork,
and community
to girls at just the
right age, says
local director
By Laurie Wheeler
For more information, visit
www.girlsontherunVT.org.
“Each participant sported the 5K event.
#1 on her jersey, and each one
Each group also takes on a
was a winner,” she noted.
community project; these have
included car washes, bake sales,
Combatting the
and planting and caring for flowmedia message
ers for a summer.
The organization’s mission, acSome 200 volunteer coaches
cording to Heydinger, of Vernon, — teachers, nurses, principals,
is “educating and preparing girls community members, and parfor a lifetime of self-respect and ents — also ser ve as mentors
healthy living”; its aim, “develop- to girls in the program.
ment of the ‘whole’ girl.”
Carol Bailey, a physical thera“Growth is phenomenal, pro- pist, is in her fifth year coaching
grams are exploding throughout Girls on the Run Vermont at
the state, demand is extremely Guilford Center School.
high,” says Heydinger. “Some
Bailey initially volunteered beschools are swelling to accom- cause “I like kids, I like running,
modate 30 to 40 girls.”
and I had a daughter in the proThe cur riculum, with two gram,” she says. She’s continued
meetings per week, has been because of the message given
designed to help each girl learn to girls that “health should be
about herself and her values, about fitness, not thinness. The
teamwork, and building com- program tries to combat the memunity, while training for the dia message that girls should
15
The Commons • June 2008 look a certain way to be happy.
We’re catching them before they
get ultra self-conscious.”
Each time the groups meet,
lessons are interspersed with
— and integrated with — games
and running laps.
According to the national
Web site, www.girlsontherun.
org, the program begins with
a three-week series of lessons,
“All About Me,” which lets girls
understand who they are and
what they stand for. It moves to
three weeks of exercises in team
building and cooperation, and
the final three weeks of the program move the girls into their
community service project.
Although the structure of the
program is the same for all age
brackets, the middle-schoolage girls get a “more targeted
and age-appropriate discussion
In their own words: What the girls thought of the program
By Laurie Wheeler
The Commons
BRATTLEBORO—With this
year’s season and the race behind them, the girls were asked
what they liked about Girls on
the Run, and what they had
lear ned from the program.
Here are some responses.
• “The best part [of GOTR]
was running with my friends,
playing games and learning
together.” —Academy School,
Brattleboro
• “It was a fantastic adventure! We ran a lot, learned a lot
and had a blast!” —Academy
School, Brattleboro
• “Girls on the Run is to
teach girls to do the right
things and teach them not to
do dr ugs.” —Dummerston
School, Dummerston
• “I feel that Girls on the
Run teaches me to do good
things and helps me to express
my feelings.” —Dummerston
School, Dummerston
• “That you can believe in
yourself … to be yourself …
being a good sport … how to
speak up for yourself … how
to treat people better … being
healthy … the 5K!” —Guilford
Central School, Guilford
Some responses to the question “what is the one thing you
like most about yourself?”
• “I am beautiful inside and
out.” —Fuller School, Keene,
NH
• “I think I am physically fit
and mentally fit and I LOVE it.”
—Fuller School, Keene, NH
• “That I can do anything
with a bit of thought.” —Fuller
School, Keene, NH
The girls, they’re
perfect the way
they are.
—Nancy Heydinger,
executive director,
Girls on the Run Vermont
16
V IE W POINTS , ESSAYS , AND PERSONA L PERSPE C TI V ES
B Y , FOR , AND A B OUT THE C ITI Z ENS OF W INDHAM C OUNTY
J OURNA L
A wise journey
A barred owl, on the slow road
back to health, has its own ideas
F
biology and science journalism. She has written several children’s
books on technology subjects.
barn. Each aviary is a roomy 10
x 12 feet, and contains windows,
beautifully carved perches, and
shelves. Very posh. Here, the
owl can start to exercise a little.
Fred places the mice on a shelf
away from the owl’s perch so it
needs to fly to get food.
As I watch the owl, I wonder
why we do it, why we bring hurt
birds and other animals to the
vets, nature centers, and rehabilitators to be given another
chance. And I wonder why the
vets and rehabilitators spend so
much of their time helping. Is it
simply because we don’t want to
see animals suffer?
Or is it more? A sense of responsibility? Guilt? Is it because
we can help, when in so many
other aspects of our lives, we
can’t?
Although Fred’s been doing
this a long time, he wonders too.
LETTER HOME
VIEWPOINT
V-Day in
New Orleans
page 18
KARYN KING/THE commons
April 15. After almost 10 weeks
of healing, Fred and I load the
owl into a cardboard travel box
and take it to the Newfane Elementary School, so the students
there can see the owl and witness its release. Fred B. and
Laura, the couple who found the
owl, come too
At noon, we gather in the field
outside the school, and Fred
opens the box. He gives the owl
to Laura, and she holds it carefully. She says it’s very light. The
children and faculty think the
owl is beautiful. Laura lifts the
owl into the air and lets go. We
watch intently, full of hope. I realize hope is as light as this owl.
The owl flies 20 feet and lands
on the field. It tries again, covering another 10 feet. It looks
balanced as it flies, but not very
strong. The owl tries once more,
but doesn’t get far. This time, it
stays on the ground.
Fred apologizes to the crowd.
One mother is crying. Her
daughter consoles her. Another
child asks if the owl will die now.
Fred says no, that it just needs
more time than he thought to
heal.
The owl flaps and flops into
the woods beyond the field.
Fred catches it and returns it to
the box. The school’s principal
thanks Fred, and the kids slowly
return to their recess.
We are quiet on the way back
to Fred’s house. Fred doesn’t
want to feel he’s failed, but
somehow he does. In all the
years he’s done releases, this is
only the third bird that has failed
to fly. I begin to wonder if it’s
been worth the effort.
Ron’s analysis of the release
confirms what we believed: the
owl simply isn’t strong enough.
After all those weeks of sitting
around, its muscles have atrophied, much as ours would in
the same situation. The owl, Ron
300 WORDS
EDITORIALS
COLUMNISTS
Fiber should
be priority
The little
things
Home Depot
ambiguities
Luskin, Clift,
Austin
page 22
page 19
page 25
pages 20–21
April 10. I visit the owl, and I
think it looks better. It clacks its
beak aggressively at Fred when
he walks over to it. Although
Fred says he’s honored to care
for the owl, I don’t think the
owl feels the same way about
him. The owl doesn’t fly around
much on its own, and Fred has
to prod it to use its wings. But
the wings look more balanced,
the left one less droopy.
April 13. Fred calls me this afternoon with good news. The
owl is growing feistier and won’t
take food until he puts it on the
floor and backs out of the aviary.
Fred believes the owl is ready
to be released. He says Tuesday
will be the day — hooray!
April 23. We pack up the owl
and bring it to the Hogback Museum, about 20 minutes away,
where Mike, a herpetologist,
takes care of the museum’s disabled hawks and owls, which are
used for education. Mike is going to make and fit jesses (short
leg straps) for the owl so Fred
can begin an exercise program.
“Do you have a PT license as
well?” I jokingly ask Fred on the
way.
“No,” Fred sighs, “but I guess
I’ll learn.” This guy won’t give
up.
Unfortunately, Mike doesn’t
have all of the right tools, and after two hours of fooling around
with kangaroo leather, we realize we’ll have to return. On the
way home, we feel frustrated.
Once Fred gets the jesses, it’s
going to be at least another two
weeks. Twice a day, Fred will
fly the owl on a line tied to the
jesses, making the bird work its
wings.
April 30. I call Fred, only to
hear that Mike hasn’t yet contacted him about the jesses. I’m
beginning to worry about the
owl’s future.
Elizabeth Macalaster has a background in marine
March 19. The wing has healed,
and Ron operates again to remove the pin from the owl’s
bone and sutures from the
wounds. The owl comes through
fine and returns to Fred’s. It’s
been five weeks since the bird
was found.
In addition to this bird, Fred
has been caring for three other
owls, all of them found starvFeb. 16. After his regular office
ing. If Fred gets a weak owl in
hours, Ron operates on the owl. time, he has pretty good success
He gives the bird anesthesia
in fattening it up, and he usuand inserts a rod into the broally releases it within a couple of
ken humerus. He secures it on
weeks.
the outside of the wing with a
This winter, Fred helped many
gel-like material, sutures up the more owls than normal. The
owl’s skin, and immobilizes the
plethora of starving owls, Fred
wing with a kind of sling. Then
thinks, is due to an unusually
he calls Fred Homer.
good 2007 for rodents, which led
to good spring egg clutches and
Feb. 17. Fred Homer collects
thriving young owlets. But then
the owl. Fred is a licensed wilda long winter arrived. Experts
life rehabilitator, and like Ron,
at the Vermont Institute of Natuhas been helping animals for
ral Sciences say a thick crust of
more than 20 years. Ron says his snow and a shortage of a favorite
success in healing birds of prey vole made hunting tough. Also,
very much relies on Fred taking barred owls from territories
over after he operates. Ron and
farther north traveled south in
Fred make a good team. Fred
search of food, increasing comtakes the owl to his house to rest petition among already large
and mend. Once a day, by hand, populations here. Rehabilitators
Fred feeds the owl three mice,
all over the region are busy.
plus antibiotics. Fred watches
the owl closely and is heartened March 26. I visit the owl. Fred
to see it eat so well.
has moved it to a larger cage up
in his barn. The owl eats on its
Feb. 29. I visit the owl for the
own now, grabbing mice with
first time. It’s in a small cage
its beak when Fred puts them
in the dark, quiet basement of
in the cage. The owl can stretch
Fred’s house. Even in the darkthat left wing but has lost a lot of
ness, I notice the owl’s lovely
muscle strength. I don’t think it
brown and white barred pattern, looks very alert.
its round eyes and yellow beak.
I’m impressed with its quiet
March 31. On this visit I see that
dignity.
Fred has moved the owl to one
of two aviaries he has built in the
17
says, needs physical therapy. PT
for an owl? I ask. Yes!
Voices
South Newfane
eb. 15, 2008: My neighbors, Fred B. and Laura,
find a hurt barred owl
on Route 30. It looks like the
owl’s broken a wing. They
bring it to Ron Svec, a vet at
the VT-NH Veterinary Clinic in
Dummerston. Ron, who’s been
helping wild birds for over 20
years, takes an Xray of the owl’s
left wing. Its humerus is broken. But it’s a clean break, and
there’s no sign of infection. Ron
thinks he can fix the wing.
The Commons • June 2008 May 5. Fred calls and leaves a
message on my answering machine. “The owl is gone,” he
says.
I stare at the phone in disbelief. Fred had left the door to the
aviary open a little while showing a visitor something else in
the barn. The owl simply flew
out. Just like that. No spectacular release in front of a crowd
— not even a toss in the air at
Fred’s house. No ceremony at
all.
At first I feel robbed. After
all, I had loyally followed the
bird’s rehabilitation for months.
I wanted to see this magnificent bird of prey open its wings
and soar into the sky. But then
I remember: an owl is silent,
stealthy, and wise. Clearly, it offers much to teach us.
I smile, and feel relief
and gladness — and abunn
dant hope. V IE W POINT
Not a slam-dunk
Rev. Wright’s misguided comments might open a welcome
dialogue about the still-far-from-certain origin of AIDS
The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a
means of genocide against people of color. The government lied.
—Rev. Jeremiah Wright
T
Brattleboro
he origin of AIDS
which so many think is a
slam dunk — chimpanzees harboring the virus and
an African hunter contracting it
and then sexually passing it on
— makes many of us smug because we don’t see ourselves in
this picture.
But this narrative also makes
many others angry. After all,
there is so much about AIDS
which could be best characterized as a racially charged
narrative.
There are those who even
deny HIV causes AIDS, and others like Jeremiah Wright believe
the virus was created in a U.S.
government lab. Then there is
the widely accepted belief that
Africans were the bridge that
carried HIV from lower primates
to the rest of humanity. This
view easily encompasses stereotypes about black people, the
jungle, and sexuality.
Scientifically speaking, the
latest research does indeed
confirm that HIV is genetically
related to what are misleadingly
called Simian Immunodeficiency
Viruses. These, in fact, rarely
cause immunodeficiency in their
primate hosts. Moreover, the
evolutionary proximity of HIV
in humans and SIVs in chimpanzees tells us very little about the
birth of the pandemic and the
actual human history of AIDS.
Humans and chimps are close
first cousins, sharing some 98
percent of the same genetic material. For most of our history
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
The AIDS virus.
Stephen F. Minkin is
the author of a forthcoming
book, The Missing History of
AIDS.
we shared the same geography.
Our ancestors — human and
proto-human — hunted, killed,
and butchered chimps from
the dawn of history. Unlike our
cousins, we wandered farther,
eventually colonizing nearly the
entire planet.
Humans hunted chimpanzees for millennia. Why, then, is
it only in the late 20th century
that AIDS emerged following a
supposed accident between one
particularly unlucky hunter and
a bloodied chimpanzee?
And what about the Great
Misery?
For 400 years, millions of
West Africans were forcibly
transported to the Americas.
Slaves were exploited physically and sexually. Certainly
AIDS, if it was indeed of African origin, would have emerged
in North America long before
the Emancipation Proclamation
and should have spread widely
in Latin America and the Caribbean as well.
AIDS is not like bird flu and
other epidemics because the
disease is imbued with stigmas
and remains an easy source of
prejudice.
Inner-city communities faced
with higher rates of IV drug
abuse have suffered disproportionately higher levels of
HIV infection. But these communities also suffer the lowest
quality of health care, and the
heaviest disease burdens including morbidity from cancer,
childhood asthmas, heart disease, poor nutrition, and a host
of other illnesses. And when
African-Americans get these diseases they are more likely to die
sooner from them because of racial disparities in treatment.
Young African-Americans who
are at greatest risk for contracting HIV are also more likely
to die violent deaths or go to
prison. Their job prospects are
poorer, their schools worse.
Beyond these well-documented disparities even more
visceral scars affect perceptions
about AIDS.
An ugly history of medical experimentation on blacks
dates back from gruesome
gynecological surgery in the antebellum South to the notorious
Tuskegee syphilis experiments
and the use of largely black
prison inmates for testing toxicity of drugs and even cosmetics.
During World War II, AfricanAmerican blood was segregated
from whites’ blood supplies and
was considered unfit for use in
the production of blood plasma
critical to the war effort.
The notion that AIDS was
born in Africa and then spread
to the rest of the world runs
contrary to Africans’ own experience. They read about AIDS
in the United States and Europe
before actually seeing it themselves. Physicians working in
Africa found AIDS a strikingly
new phenomenon.
It is therefore not surprising
that many Africans puzzle about
how AIDS first came there, and
many do subscribe to the theory espoused by Rev. Wright
that the HIV was cooked up in a
lab and then released upon the
world.
Why AIDS became pandemic, how long it has been
around, and why it impacts
some communities or even continents more than others are
questions yet to be critically addressed. In part this is because
the story of the bloody encounter between the hunter and
chimpanzee is so simple, neat,
and exotic.
But more mundane and
sloppy issues may shed more
light on the direction of the
spread of AIDS than either Rev.
Wright’s remarks or renowned
judgment of the prevailing scientific wisdom.
For example, U.S. blood products that lead to HIV outbreaks
all over the world were also
exported to Africa. Likewise,
sexual intercourse between European men and Africans of both
sexes occurred in African cities.
So perhaps after the smoke
clears, Rev. Wright’s statements,
however misguided, could have
the salutary effect of opening a critical dialogue about
AIDS and race, and the search
n
for solutions. 18
L ETTER HOME
Travels to the ‘Love Dome’
A poignant trip to a still-devastated and now-forgotten New Orleans
V-Day supports anti-violence
organizations throughout the
world, helping them to continue
and expand their core work
on the ground, while drawing
public attention to the larger
fight to stop worldwide violence
(including rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation
(FGM), sexual slavery) against
women and girls. V-Day combines art and activism to stage
large-scale benefits and produce
innovative gatherings, films,
and programs to educate and
change social attitudes regarding violence against women.
—www.vday.org
Nancy Clingan is
founder and director of Making
the Most of I, a free program
that has offered women support,
education and resources for
aking healthy changes in their
lives for 10 years.
week they were there. He’d pick
them up in the morning; they’d
pick up beignets and coffee for
him, and he’d pick them up at
the end of their day of replanting trees in the parks. I called
Buddy ahead of time to pick
me up Friday afternoon at the
NOLA airport.
I left Vermont that Friday
Saxtons River morning to drive to Hartford to
’ve wanted to go to Vcatch my plane after breakfast
Day for a few years now,
at the local general store. Very
but usually was unable to
soon, on the road, it started to
go because the annual event
rain, and I started feeling sick
was being held in the Congo or to my stomach. Really sick. I
Afghanistan or Croatia.
considered turning around and
V-Day founder Eve Ensler
going home.
is my hero: she’s gone all over
But I was not to be deterred
the globe moving and shaking,
from this trip!
drawing attention to violence
against women. In the Congo,
Buddy Love, a large man
she’s built a hospital where
with a big smile and a bit of graya doctor performs reparative
ing stubble on his chin, arrived
surgery on women who have
at the airport within minutes of
traumatic fistulae after having
my arrival to pick me up, along
been brutally raped. She’s built a with another woman who was
safe home and school for girls in also headed for the V-Day activiKenya to escape genital mutilaties, with his orange Yellow Cab.
tion. With performances of her
Buddy began telling us all about
world renowned play The Vathe hot spots, where to go for
gina Monologues she has raised the best gumbo, and where to
over $50 million to end violence find the happiest hours with the
against women.
biggest drinks.
We told him we were here to
So when I heard that Entransform the Superdome into
sler was taking V-Day to New
the “Love Dome” — Buddy
Orleans this year, I promised
liked that. We told him about
myself I’d go. My sister, Joanie
Eve Ensler bringing home 1,200
and her husband, Frank, had
women who had been evacubeen to New Orleans several
ated from New Orleans after
times since the Katrina hurthe flood, at her expense. They
ricane and flood, doing relief
were put up in a fine hotel and
work, so we agreed to meet
given medical, dental, and
there the weekend of April 11,
and share a room in the French mental-health care, along with
massages and makeovers. HopeQuarter.
fully, they made connections
My friend Cyndy had been
that allowed them to return to
down earlier this year and told
their hometowns.
me about Buddy Love, the perfect, gregarious and industrious
Thousands of people were
cab driver they’d used the entire coming from all over the globe
I
‘
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JOAN CLINGAN
Eve Ensler, playwright and founder of V-Day, with Dr. Denis Mukwege, who performs
reparative surgery on survivors of rape and violence at a hospital in the Congo.
to attend, we told Buddy, including Several Nobel Peace Prize
winners who would describe
changes in their countries.
There would be a parade with
a jazz band and a grand marshall, not an unusual event
in this town. It would start at
Congo Square, where African
slaves from all countries used
to meet on Sundays to eat and
play music. A Red Tent, based
on the Anita Diamant novel of
the same name, built inside the
Love Dome, would let women
come in and relax, be supported,
soothed, and comforted.
Buddy was impressed. He realized we weren’t interested in
gumbo and happy hour (especially me, at the moment). He
started telling us his own ideas
about the flood, the way FEMA
supposedly diverted $8 billion,
how he’d heard the story of a
white antiques dealer who’d
been flown to a ski resort in Vermont, then flown home, at the
expense of FEMA. He told us
how the 65-year-old low-income
housing projects were being
bull-dozed as we spoke, and
how new condos were rising in
their place for families that earn
$100,000 a year or more. Buddy
offered to take us on tours of the
Lower Ninth Ward, for only $20
a head.
When Buddy later dropped
me at the “Love Dome,” he told
me he’d be off duty by the time
the show was over. He’d be enjoying his favorite snack of a pint
of whiskey and a bag of Lay’s
potato chips and watching the
Saints on TV. We had different priorities, clearly, but I also
knew we had something deeper
to share.
When I went into the huge
cement Superdome, I was
stunned to see the stadium so
transformed.
The “Love Dome” was now
New Orleans cabbie Buddy Love.
full of lush and beautiful fabric
draping the cement bleachers.
Art hung everywhere: sculpture of women and babies from
all countries, photos of families
who’d been displaced, and paintings of historical women we
honor.
Still, the mental image of
those thousands of people who
sat on these cold cement floors
almost 29 months before, who
sat without beds, without food,
without water — that image
charged full-on into my brain.
My equilibrium compromised, I
felt woozy and weak again.
Even the Red Tent, which was
so beautifully and thoughtfully
done, with soft pillows and rugs
on the floor, altars to Quan Yin
and the Blessed Mother, the finest flower arrangements and
subtle lighting — even all that
could not quite wipe out that
memory of those abandoned
and terrified people.
People are still living in tents,
today, under the same highways
where they were herded and
held for days, without even water. The irony this day was that
the only water available to the
JOAN CLINGAN
returning 1,200 women and the
entire crowd attending V-Day
had to be purchased from union
vendors for $3.50 a bottle. No
water could be brought into the
stadium. The lines to get water,
again, were long and slow.
That night’s performance
was Swimming Upstream, an
original play, similar to The Vagina Monologues, where real
stories of real women after the
flood were recorded and then
acted by real actors. The spoken-word artists were well
known: Anna Deavere Smith,
Alix Olson, Lenelle Moise and
Asali Njeri DeVan.
The performances were very
moving and powerful. Two large
screens on either side of the
stage illuminated and reflected
their range of emotions that
resonated with most of the audience. Their words were angry,
sad, and preposterous. The stories were absurdly maddening.
More than a million people
were forced to evacuate their
hometown, a town that for many
residents links to a history that
goes back to their ancestors’
The Commons • June 2008 slavery. Several hundred thousands have not returned. Some
never will. More than 2,000 people died, and more than 300,000
homes were destroyed.
The performances and panel
discussions went on all weekend
attended by packed audiences.
Women from Guatemala, the
Philippines, Iraq, Haiti, India,
Mexico, and others spoke to the
crowd about the atrocities still
taking place in their countries.
There were “Activists Lounges”
set up on the second floor where
people could come to talk, to
mourn, and to discover what
they could do on a personal
level.
The Katrina Warriors is one of
these groups, comprised of individuals and organizations doing
work to support the well being
of women and girls along the
Gulf coast. Women head the majority of families left homeless by
hurricane Katrina. The women
of the Gulf Coast have survived
fallout from global warming, failure of public structures, racism,
economic hardship, and domestic abuse.
I asked the beautiful young
woman at the front desk of our
hotel if she knew where I might
find some old religious artifacts, like medals or statues. I
wanted to add one to my altar at
home. She sent me to the laundry room to Donna, whom she
described as a spiritual woman
who would know where to send
me.
A small woman wearing a
mustard-colored uniform with
a white collar, Donna and I
talked for quite some time in the
steamy room. She told me that
she and her husband had been
evacuated from New Orleans
to Tulsa. After they were there
a few months, living under extreme poverty and major stress,
her husband had a heart attack.
He hated Tulsa and wanted to
come back to New Orleans, to
his own doctor and hospital.
Donna said that the hospital
they usually used had closed,
and he was sent to another. By
the time he finally got to a medical facility, he died. She said he
was stubborn; he died because
he wanted his doctor and hospital that had known all his life.
She told me she is only 49, and
now lives with her children and
grandchildren. I gave her some
of the money a friend had given
me for the trip.
Buddy Love, stubble and
smile ever present, drove my
sister and brother-in-law and
me out to a church they had attended several times in earlier
visits. Joanie has known Ken,
the minister of the church, for
years through her work and has
been in touch with him about
his community rebuilding work
since the flooding.
Ken grew up in the projects
that were now being bulldozed
across the street. He and Buddy
agreed that the projects had
their problems — drugs, crime,
and so on — but that now, no
one knows where all those people will live.
I didn’t want to take Buddy’s
tour of the Lower Ninth Ward; I
would feel like a sightseer driving through the ruins. I did walk
around the area by the church
and the former site of the lowincome housing; to my amateur
eye, those brick buildings easily
looked sturdy and solid enough
to renovate. I found remnants of
a clarinet, a bicycle, and ruined
photos.
Everyone attending V-Day
was waiting for Saturday night’s
show, a grand-finale, celebritypacked performance of The
Vagina Monologues.
But my favorite performance
came just before that, when The
Houmas Group, a troupe of children dressed in orange leather
and feather costumes came on
stage to dance and sing to the
percussion of their family. A
combination of African descendants and Native Americans,
the troupe strives to keep their
ethnicity and culture pure and
strong. The faces of these children beamed with great pride
and reflected who they are, individually, and as a group.
Later that night we filled the
stadium for the performance.
Jane Fonda, Rosario Dawson,
Kerry Washington, Jennifer
Beals, and many others took the
roles that unfailingly shock and
humor us, the audience, with
stories of women’s real lives.
The 1,200 women who’d returned to New Orleans watched
from orchestra seating and were
certainly honored by the special treatment they’d received all
week. The New Orleans Gospel
Choir and Jazz Band, led by Rev.
Lois DeJean, delivered thrilling
and chilling music that brought
all to their feet, joining other artists like Faith Hill, Charmane
Neville, and Jennifer Hudson.
Dr. Mukwege, the surgeon
19
from the Congo, was introduced
and received a thunderous
standing ovation. Eve Ensler,
dripping with sweat, hugged
everyone within reach. Yes,
she’s my hero. She has an exciting life, and a rich one; without
a doubt, she puts her money
where her mouth is.
After the show, the 1,200
women wound their way back
to their luxury buses and hotels, and the crowds dispersed
through the streets, many wearing pink, red, feathers, glitter,
and carrying signs with words
of hope for change.
Sunday, I rented a bike and
we happened to pass the Preservation Jazz Hall and found
ourselves treated to several free
sets of music by international
musicians. That night, we rode
on the path next to the river,
with lights shining on the water.
There’s a statue there, in white
stone, a lovely woman reaching
toward heaven, welcoming the
immigrants to New Orleans.
By Monday morning, my
stomach felt just fine when
Buddy Love drove me to the
airport. He shared how the people of New Orleans have lived
through worse than Katrina, and
it’s their faith that keeps them
going and knowing it will all be
all right in the end.
He told me he was beginning
to believe Vermont has a very
special sort of people and he’d
like to visit there one day. We
joked about taking a road trip
there in the orange Yellow cab.
As I flew out over Lake
Pontchartrain, the feelings of all
I’d seen and experienced hit me
n
and the tears fell. 3 0 0 W ORDS
The little things
S
Brattleboro
ometimes it’s
not the really awful
things that push us
over the edge, but the small,
niggling annoyances we
experience.
Here are a few examples.
• A news story describing
a calamity that has befallen
a family, or an organization
that needs urgent help will
list the address to send a donation. I have done this on
occasion. If you are expressly
asking for monetary contributions and you receive
some, why wouldn’t you
then write a quick thank-you
note? Is that too much to ask?
Apparently it is. Whatever
happened to everyday manners and courtesy?
• Web sites often offer an
e-mail address. I send them
my question. I never hear
back. Why? If you’re going
to have a Web site, then for
pity’s sake, monitor it and
respond to people who take
the time to write. If you don’t
have the time, then remove
the e-mail address from the
site.
• When I need to contact someone self-employed
— say, a carpenter, an electrician, or a painter — I leave
a message on their phone.
I wait and wait — and wait
— for a call back. It never
Kim Noble used 299
words.
happens.
Does this mean they are
soooooo terribly busy that
they don’t have time to return my call? How many
seconds would it take to call
me back and say “I’m sorry,
but I already have too much
work. You’ll have to find
someone else.” Fine, I can do
that, but not if I keep waiting
for you to have the common
decency to return my call.
I try not to take these
things personally, but I do.
Why is no one getting back
to me? Have I done something to offend them?
Please — tell me what it is,
and I promise to never do it
again.
Hello? Hello? Are
n
you there? Do you want to express a
truth, a peeve, an appreciation of life? The Commons
invites you to write about
any real-life experience in
300 words or less. Send your
contributions via e-mail to
editor@commonsnews.org,
or via post to P.O. Box 1212,
Brattleboro, VT 05302. We
will choose one essay to run
in each issue.
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The Brattleboro Savings
& Loan is pleased to
support the Commons’
Media Mentoring Project,
a grassroots initiative
that helps budding
journalists write more
effectively about local
events and issues. Clear
communication leads
to understanding—and
that’s something we
wholeheartedly endorse.
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8/21/07 9:18:34 AM
20
Luck o’ the Irish for Barack O’Bama?
I
Putney
think we can all agree
that Barack Obama will be
the Democrats’ candidate
for President in ‘08. Now, how
are we going to talk the American public into voting for him?
Obama is a black man, after
all, and our citizenry has never
been fond of embracing new
ideas. It did take until 1922 for
the House of Representatives
to come up with a law specifically outlawing lynching, the
Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill, which
died as a result of a filibuster in
the Senate. Abandoning racism
is going to be tough for a lot of
Americans.
At this writing, in a race for
a congressional seat in Mississippi, Republican Greg Davis
has had Dick Cheney stumping
for him. Cheney constantly compares Davis’s opponent, white
Democrat Travis Childers, to
Barack Obama with a disparaging racial subtext.
Former Governor William
Winter says he is “appalled
that this blatant appeal to racial
JIM
AUSTIN
prejudice is still being employed.” All I can say is if this
Davis character is elected after having been endorsed by
Vice President Satan himself,
then the citizens of Mississippi
should be stripped of their right
to vote. We don’t allow felons
and the retarded to vote, do we?
Ipso facto, dude.
This is merely round one in
the deluge of race baiting that is
bound to come. McCain will not
sully his own lily-white hands
with any racial slurs. He has an
army of little Republican lice to
do that for him. No doubt the
swift-boaters are passing the
hat around the Klan clubhouse,
building funds for their assault
on Obama.
John McCain will no doubt
disavow any of the offal vomited by his minions, but don’t
you dare believe him. This is the
man who said of Jerry Falwell:
“He is an agent of intolerance.”
He said that during the 2000
campaign about the guy who
later claimed gays and lesbians were responsible for 9/11.
I can’t remember if that was
around the time he said that
Jews will never get to heaven until they accept Jesus.
Now, years later, we find
brother McCain crawling on
his belly up to Falwell’s Liberty University to deliver the
commencement address. The
Straight Talk Express had
clearly blown a transmission.
During the 2000 campaign
McCain himself was assailed
by Bush’s hit men and accused
of fathering a black child out
of wedlock. The truth was that
McCain’s “love child” was an
adopted youngster from Bangladesh. I’ll bet you could have
knocked him over with a feather
when his bid for votes as the
compassionate lover of poor
foreign waifs was spun into a
nasty sex scandal by sewagemeister Karl Rove. I wonder if
he sent the little girl back?
Rather than bear ill will like
any normal human being, McCain waited about a month
before he was back osculating
Bush’s butt for all he was worth.
His lust for the presidency has
obviously obliterated any spine
that he may have had.
with to libel Barack? I suspect
that much of America is a dry
sponge ready to sop up any lie
that will give them an excuse to
jump parties and vote Republican. Maybe Barack could be
rumored to use the blood of
Christian babies to make soup.
(No, wait — that’s the Jews.)
Symbionese Liberation Army?
Black Panthers? Nope — too
young.
Rather than give them ideas,
I’m not going to hold my
I’ll just say that you have not
breath and hope for any shred of heard the last of Reverend
intelligence from the voting pub- Wright. You will hear Barack’s
lic. Obama can write off a large
ill-considered quote about bitportion of the electorate who are ter low-income Pennsylvanians
just openly racist and won’t vote hanging onto their guns and refor his complexion.
ligion until you want to puke.
Hillary Clinton, who took 70
It doesn’t matter that his statepercent of the vote, won the
ment was correct in every detail;
West Virginia primary; 20 perhe just has to learn to avoid uncent of voters told exit pollsters
pleasant truths.
that race was the reason they
There is one thing he can do
voted for her. If a fifth of the vot- to avoid this entire racial epiers would admit to being low-life sode. He should just declare
racists, how many were sophisti- himself an Irishman. O’Hara,
cated enough to lie about it?
O’Brien … O’Bama.
What creative horrors will
Makes sense to me. Erin Go
n
the “McCainiacs” come up
Bragh, Barack. Young adults struggle with a postmodern world
R
The problem seems to be
more prevalent among our
occasion to talk with
daughters, young women who
ELAYNE
some old friends
by nature, one could argue, are
CLIFT
and colleagues, some of whom
more perceptive and more willI haven’t spoken to in two deing to articulate their struggles.
cades. Naturally, in the course
These women want careers,
of playing catch-up, we talked
for which they have trained and
about our kids, all young adults career-oriented, if not
from which they derive the juice
trying to make their way in the career-driven, people are also
of life; at the same time, they
world. As a result, I’ve come to
politically savvy purveyors of the want families and healthy home
see modern life as pretty toxic
landscape looming large before lives with partners who “get it”
and dysfunctional and to wonthem, and a lot of them don’t like and are in for the long haul. It
der what our legacy to our kids what they see.
doesn’t sound like they’re askreally is.
ing too much to me.
Some say they feel “trapped”
I’m not talking about enviBut their desire for a viable
in a world without values. Othronmental or economic issues,
combination of love and work
ers think a career change
although those issues exist as
can seem like a lot in the “real
might give their lives more
well. I’m talking about the frenzy meaning or a new relationship
world” because that world is still
and frustration of daily life.
laden with organizations that
might reinvigorate them. But
Nearly everyone had a story
don’t understand, value, or get
the subtle subtext — the back
to tell about how their kids are
behind healthy lifestyles no matstory, if you will — the comtrying to cope — with city life,
ter what their gender manuals
mon denominator is that these
with negotiating healthy relasay.
thirtysomethings are feeling
tionships, with balancing love
Colleagues who would make
scared about their futures and
and work in a culture that calls
great friends (or perhaps life
suffocated by systems and exsuch striving “lack of ambition.” pectations they didn’t expect to
partners) push themselves to
These bright, well-educated, and face.
the limit, forfeiting God knows
Saxtons River
ecently I’ve had
25 Elliot Street,
Brattleboro
802-254-8160
www.everyonesbks.com
my friend said. “But we failed to
realize that we didn’t want to live
like men. What we really wanted
was a paradigm shift. In that
sense, we failed our daughters.”
I think she’s right, even
though I recognize that the
women’s movement is an evolutionary one. I just hope that
our daughters and the men they
love, our sons and the women
I asked one friend if
she thought the Third Wave
they love, and everyone else out
— feminists of our daughters’
there, from politicians to pungeneration — were doing anydits, can give the subject of our
thing to change things. She said true legacy some thought.
she didn’t see it and that it would
What kind of a world have we
be terribly hard in today’s world. bequeathed to our young, after
By way of example, she told
all? How can we help them live
me her pregnant daughter, who lives of value (and self respect),
works for a lead agency supat work and at home? If each of
porting reproductive rights, was us had it to do over again, what
admonished to produce a note
might we have done differently,
n
from the doctor because of a
for their sakes? hospitalization that caused her
to be absent from work. “You
know, our generation fought to
enter the workplace, to have it
all, to live our lives like men did,”
what in their personal lives,
thereby setting standards that
others dare not confess they find
too hard to emulate. Today’s information technology doesn’t
help. And so the frenzy is perpetuated because no one is willing
to stop the world, get off for a
bit, and help to reshape it.
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The Commons • June 2008 Poultry’s contributions to language:
something to crow about
H
Williamsville
umans have been
living with chickens
for millennia, which
may explain why our language
is rife with chicken metaphors.
As one who has tended a backyard flock of poultry for more
than 20 years, I have learned to
question the truth of some of
those pithy bits of chicken wisdom and to revere the truth in
others.
Take, for instance, the advice
not to count your chickens before they hatch. Incubation of
fertile eggs is an iffy enterprise:
a broody hen is just as likely to
walk off the job as a fertile egg
in an incubator will turn out a
dud.
Once, I did have remarkable
success with incubating eggs
from my own flock with our
homemade incubator. I didn’t
count the chickens before they
hatched, but I started calculating my profits as soon as 20
chicks emerged from 24 fertile eggs. I was congratulating
myself.
I anticipated such a high yield
from this home-hatched flock
that I planned to hang one of
those hand-painted “Eggs for
Sale” signs at the end of the
drive. I figured, at least, I’d
be able to earn chicken feed.
Meanwhile, only after investing
in several weeks of expensive
grain did my new hens mature
sufficiently to show their true
feathers. More than half of my
chicks were roosters.
“Chicken feed” — a term used
with some disdain for a paltry
amount of money — is, in fact,
a significant portion of a hobbyists’ discretionary income.
Chickens, notoriously, eat like
birds: pretty much constantly.
Quite purposefully, I neither
keep track of what I spend on
chicken feed, nor do I sell my
eggs. If I knew what I spent on
grain, I might wring my own
neck, or buy myself a ring and
necklace of enormous value, but
the chickens don’t care if I wear
jewels, as long as I bring them
food and water. And if I charged
what it costs to produce our
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eggs, no one could afford them.
Roosters, famously, crow at
dawn. To get up with the cock
is considered a virtuous habit.
In reality, one who lives with
roosters has no choice. Roosters
make a lot of noise.
It would take a pharmacopeia of sleeping potions to sleep
through the crowing of a cock,
a song that is not, in fact, a precise announcement of sunrise.
All the roosters we’ve ever had
have been anxious fellows, so
determined to come in on cue
that they start crowing in anticipation of dawn, to be certain not
to miss it. It’s not industry that
gets the keeper of chickens up
at dawn; it’s insomnia.
While roosters are better at
keeping us up than waking us
up, they are nevertheless worth
keeping around. As it’s said,
roosters crow, and hens deliver.
Hens lay better with a rooster
in the coop. But there must only
be one cock of the walk. For the
sake of the chicken keeper —
and especially for the sake of the
chicken-keeper’s small children
— it’s better if the single rooster
is a small, hen-pecked fellow.
We once had a barred rock
rooster – a handsome giant
bird, full of himself and a bully
not only to the hens in the hen
house, but towards his human
keepers, as well. He grew massive spurs, and he’d rush me
as soon as I turned my back
to leave. I found myself in the
ironic situation of backing out of
the hen house, as if he were royalty upon whom it was forbidden
to turn my back.
But the bad bird attacked
men, too, which was not wise.
There was already ill will between the rooster and the man
of the house when one summer day, with family picnicking
under the backyard maple,
the rooster attacked one of my
toddlers.
This was witnessed not only
by her father, but also by her
grandfather and no fewer than
three uncles. In an act of primitive brutality on a par with the
boys who kill the pig in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies,
these otherwise mild-mannered,
highly educated, well-heeled,
and briefcase-toting men flung
shoes at the offending beast,
then grabbed sticks and clubbed
the rooster to death.
My daughter clung to me
and I to her. I’m still not sure
which was more traumatizing,
the rooster attack (the animal’s
spurs drew blood on my daughter’s tummy) or the human
attack, which resulted in a large
pot of coq au vin.
I stewed the rooster according to Julia Child’s recipe for
this classic chicken dish, which
calls for cooking the bird in a
small fortune’s worth of wine
and cognac. Even after many
hours, the bird had his revenge.
Chewing on the meat was like
gumming rubber bands — it
was that tough.
Meanwhile, hens establish
their own, precise, and nonetoo-kind, pecking order, the
sort that behavioral sociologists now decode in adolescent
girls, where certain, sexually
advanced members of a group
maintain their dominance by
pecking at their followers.
Hens don’t allow for much deviation from the norm, and girls
who closely follow the chickens’
example are doomed to unhappiness. Happily, human girls
can learn cooperation among
themselves and toleration of difference, especially when they
have good role models of mature birds — their mothers and
their mothers’ friends.
But it’s not just adolescents
who pick at one another. For
years I managed a small flock
of office workers cooped up
behind desks. One woman or
another would become dominant for a while, sometimes to
the point of domineering.
Eventually, the pecked upon
would complain. We’d endure a
few days of ruffled feathers and
broodiness, then settle back to
the business at hand, scratching
around at our desks, preening
for the male boss, and returning to our usual high standard of
productivity.
Despite keeping chickens penned up for safety, they
are easy prey for the wily and
opportunistic.
The worst predator, by far,
is the weasel, who can slither
through the smallest chink in
the fence and suck that most delectable tidbit, the brain. Since
chicken brains are notoriously
small, a weasel will often work
his way through an entire flock
in the course of a single evening,
leaving bloodless carcasses
strewn across the henhouse
floor for the unsuspecting poultry-minder to discover in the
morning. Having experienced
this depravity firsthand, the verb
to weasel has accrued a certain
piquancy for me. I never use it
lightly.
Similarly, my life with chickens has taught me respect for
the plucky birds, who have such
limited means of self defense. All
they can do is get themselves off
the ground and stay very still.
As a result, I think it’s an
insult to chickens to taunt a coward with “Chicken!” or to call
someone “chicken livered” or
“yellow.” Chicken livers are delicious, and chickens come in
all colors; some are quite handsome. In fact, nothing is quite so
comforting as watching a flock
of hens pick their way across
the landscape, gossiping, weeding, and plucking grubs from
the lawn.
It’s when they reach the edge
of the property that my poultry
pose the larger questions in life:
I have no answer for the philosophical conundrum as to why
a chicken will cross a road. I’m
simply grateful that for unknown
reasons mine don’t.
Nor has keeping chickens
solved the great ontological
question of our time: Which
came first, the chicken or the
egg?
All I know is that the question will be with us as long
as we keep chickens in
n
our backyards. 22
The Commons • June 2008 23
V IE W POINT
V IE W POINT
Telecom authority
stumbles over fiber
Community makes theater viable — and vulnerable
F
VTA was not created to play it safe
T
Alan O. Dann, a retired
telecommunications networks.”
“Fiber offers nearly limittelecommunications industry
is to bring a comless transmission capacity, can
veteran, serves on a regional
munity-owned,
support nearly any imaginable
committee exploring the possubscriber-funded fiber-optic
sibility of bringing fiber optics to communications service, and
telecommunications network
the residents in Brattleboro and the fiber lines that serve usto Windham County. The main surrounding communities. He
ers are assets with a long useful
purpose is to provide reliable
life,” Douglas observed. “Wireserves on the board of Vermont
broadband Internet service
Independent Media, publisher of less offers mobility, which no
to homes, towns, schools,
other technology does, and the
The Commons.
health clinics, and businesses
ability to rapidly deploy new netthroughout the region. The
works. The networks supported
not-so-technical name for the
by the Authority will be a careservice is “fiber to the home,”
Central Vermont Community
fully selected mixture of fiber
or FTTH. Telephone and televi- Fiber Network, or EC Fiber. Ap- and wireless infrastructure that
sion services will be available as proximately 1,300 homes and
will blanket the entire state.”
well over this data connection.
businesses have already pre-regThe legislature responded
Fiber-optic transmitters are
istered for their fiber service.
quickly. The resulting Act 79
built to send information as light
Windham County planners
refers both to broadband and
pulses along a glass or plashave looked to Burlington and
to mobile telecommunications
tic wire or fiber. The process
EC Fiber as models. Quite reproviders, presumably using
is very fast. Because the hub
cently, however, the state seems cellular or other wireless tech(or central office) is rather exto have suddenly frowned on
nologies. Bonds or notes of the
pensive, five or six thousand
the idea, despite the Governor’s Authority which are outstanding
services are required to break
stated determination to make
at any one time are restricted to
even. Network layout is less
Vermont an E-State by 2010.
$40 million in toto, as is a sepacostly. This means a market poGovernor Jim Douglas, in his rate “debt service reserve fund.”
tential of 15,000 or so is needed, 2007 inaugural address, chalThe 11-member VTA is chaired
where switching, not distance,
lenged Vermont to become the
by Mary Evslin, a veteran of the
is more the limiting cost facfirst state to provide universal
telecom and software developtor than technologies like DSL.
cellular and broadband coverment industries. State Treasurer
Windham County has about
age everywhere in its borders as Jeb Spaulding serves on the
18,000 housing units occupied
he proposed the creation of the
board.
year-round, and there seems
Vermont Telecommunications
to be interest in broadband
Authority.
EC Fiber’s Web site,
ECFiber.net, describes the conthroughout the region. Because
“Vermont can become a
sortium’s plan as a community
the fiber hub can serve addihub for the world’s most adproject to provide very high
tional customers, many others
vanced software, engineering
quality digital television, telecan be added later.
and environmental technolophone, and ultra-high-speed
The concept was reviewed
gies entrepreneurs,” Douglas
Internet services to 100 percent
by the Brattleboro Selectsaid. “These entrepreneurs will
of homes and businesses in parboard Dec. 18. The director of
form companies big and small
the Windham Regional Comthat will be able to locate across ticipating towns.
These services would come
mission, Jim Matteau, was
the state and have high-capacity
supportive. As recently as
broadband as well as ubiquitous at no cost to the towns, because
no local bonds would be issued.
March 27 Town Manager Barwireless services. The growTowns receive property-tax
bara Sondag said the town “will
ing trend in Vermont to work
be reaching out to other commu- at home will grow substantially, equivalent payments from the
network as well as eventual profnities in the County to discuss
as Vermonters throughout the
its. The venture is owned by the
a regional approach to broadstate will be able to work for
towns, funded by the subscribband,” and she urgently hoped
companies across the globe via
ers, and operated locally.
the town could help realize this
their new connections.”
An umbrella organization, Valdream.
Douglas predicted that these
ley Net, brought local dial-up
Vermont already has a munew businesses and employInternet to the area in 1994 and
nicipally owned FTTH network
ment opportunities “will drive
managed more than 6,000 cusoperated by Burlington Teleour economy and create new
comm. Furthermore, on this
revenues for our state,” and that tomers through January 2006.
Valley Net is scheduled to orgapast Town Meeting Day voteducation, health care, safety,
ers in 19 towns in the eastern
and communities will benefit as nize, design, build, and manage
the EC Fiber configuration.
counties of Vermont between
well.
Similar community-owned
Montpelier and White River
Douglas went on to call fiber
Junction agreed to establish a
optics and wireless “the building local networks have been successful in Wisconsin, Georgia,
consortium for FTTH network
blocks of any sort [of] longVirginia, Pennsylvania, Minnumber two, known now as East term strategy to upgrade the
nesota, and Tennessee. All
have long-distance network
interconnection.
FOR ADULTS, TEENS AND CHILDREN
The business plan predicts
that it would take three years to
Studio Classes , Life Drawing and Painting,
serve 25 percent of the market
Independent Study, Art and Meditation,
by offering combined services
Sculpture, Illustration Techniques,
as Internet, television, and
Printmaking and Collage,
telephone.
Teen Portfolio class,
In EC Fiber’s application to
Homeschooler and
3*7&3
the Vermont TelecommunicaTots classes.
("--&3:
tions Authority for funding, the
Saturday classes and
group pointed out that the Ver4$)00Weekend Workshops
0'"35
mont Municipal Bond Bank
would be asked to act as the
funding conduit for capital lease
$BMM 32 Main St. Brattleboro
funding and that financial enrgsart @ sover.net
www.rivergalleryschool.org
dorsement from the VTA, now
he proposal
Marlboro
"SU$MBTTFT
Brattleboro
or new and young
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
Fiber optics offers a promising future to Vermont, but only
if companies can invest in the technology.
that it exists, would be essential
for modest credit enhancement to provider banks who
participate.
It will be necessary to borrow
$3,200 to serve each customer.
The venture would eventually
require backing of $90 million,
of which VTA was asked for $4
million immediately and an additional $4 million in reserve
for five years to protect against
unanticipated delays in market
penetration. (In Burlington, fiber
service areas built before 2007
already serve more than 40 percent of households.)
former Executive Director Tim
Nulty left last fall, Jonathan
Leopold, the city’s chief administrative officer, hired a consultant
whose chief contribution seems
to have been his suggestion
that the company hire a sales
manager.
Still, according to Leopold, the
break-even point will now come
as early as December.
The apparent quick change
in attitude on the state’s part
puzzles folks in southern Vermont. Talk is fine, but small
towns with dialup Internet need
money. Loaning $4 million out of
On April 3, the VTA informed $40 million to EC Fiber so that
legislators and selectboard
hordes of unserved and undermembers in the 19 easternserved broadband users can be
county towns that EC Fiber’s
brought online seems exactly
financial requests would be
what Act 79 intended.
rejected.
Should that money be used
Executive Director Bill
simply to help Verizon build celShuttleworth cited the curlular towers? Should FairPoint
rent financial market instability
be protected from the com(which FairPoint encountered
petitive influence of modern
in that company’s Verizon landtechnology? Is it right to criticize
line takeover) and the relatively Burlington Telecom when the
low rural density of EC Fiber’s
department and the city seem to
territory (as compared with Bur- be doing so well? After all, in 15
lington’s) as the two “hurdles”
states incumbent providers have
that precipitated the authority’s
seen to it that municipal teleaction. On April 22, the VTA
communications departments
made the announcement public are not permitted at all!
and said that EC would instead
Bill Shuttleworth says that
receive a $25,000 planning grant, the governor and state treasurer
presumably to enhance their
“will not allow the VTA to issue
current business plan.
any bonds, nor will the bonds be
Meanwhile, Burlington Telemarketable, unless the revenues
com’s 3,100 customers cover its that support the bonds are exoperating costs,The company’s
tremely secure.” Watchfulness
municipal leg has already enis certainly admirable, but with
abled schools to improve their
start-up ventures in a developinformation technology capabili- ing E-State, where the working
ties and save money at the same model is succeeding so beautitime.
fully, is this a realistic approach?
Burlington Telecom’s sucAt a May 21 meeting in
cess comes despite challenges.
Brattleboro to discuss county
Adelphia put up competitive
broadband and fiber options,
roadblocks which stretched out Tim Nulty noted that the 23 eastthe timeframe and forced BT
central towns who comprise EC
to borrow more money. SubFiber’s territory have received
sequent delays ensued with
three replies to their $90 million
lengthy pole preparation disfunding request for proposal.
cussions with the municipally
It’s a shame this is not beowned and operated Burlingcause of a forward-looking state
n
ton Electric Department. After
policy, but in spite of it. American playwrights,
submitting new works
to professional companies in
the hopes of seeing them performed is, in the words of
Guilford composer and author
Zeke Hecker, “like throwing
your work into a black hole.”
Be it the economics or the
politics of contemporary theater,
professional companies rarely
take on works by unknown authors, and in the United States,
community theaters tend to
stick to a standard repertoire.
The insistence by these companies to perform tried-and-true
plays, particularly in rural areas,
means they virtually never perform new work.
It is therefore fortunate and
exciting that the Vermont Theatre Company, which describes
itself as Brattleboro’s “only true
community theater,” puts an astonishing amount of work and
personal commitment into doing
just that.
Having successfully staged
two of Hecker’s musicals in
the past, Double Exposure and
Bemused, it was natural for
Hecker’s friend and collaborator
Bob Kramsky to decide to produce a third, The Lift.
Hecker, a self-proclaimed
“amateur” (largely meaning self-taught) composer and
playwright, wants his works produced in the community where
they were created. He and
Kramsky had worked together
in the past, and were familiar
with the company, the cast and
the audience as well as with
each other.
It was particularly surprising, then, when after three days
of successful performances to
increasing audiences, the cast
of The Lift was informed that
the second weekend would
be cancelled due to an anonymous complaint Kramsky had
received.
The complainant objected to
the casting of 18-year-old BUHS
student Kario Pereira-Bailey in
a role that portrays a sexual encounter with an older woman.
Caitlin Baucom, a
regular contributor to The
Commons, is a graduate of the
Putney School and The Evergreen State College in Olympia,
Wash., where she studied theory
and practice in contemporary
arts, literature and music, as
well as contemporary cultural
criticism.
That the complaint was
made is almost reassuring. If
there are complaints; at least
people are watching with critical attention. It would be more
encouraging, however, if the
criticism pertained to the actual
work instead of looking at casting with a startlingly Victorian
eye.
That the complainant threatened the director with some
unspecified action, demanded
that he close the show, forbade
any private taping of the show
to replace the taping planned for
the second week, and demanded
that his or her identity remain
anonymous — and succeeded
— is not reassuring.
“Because the performers and
other artists are also involved in
other aspects of their community, non-professional theatre
can develop a broad base of
support and attendance among
those who might not normally
patronize the professional arts,”
observes the Wikipedia entry
for “community theater.”
Perhaps this is part of the
problem. If audience members
are coming not to see a new and
potentially exciting theatrical
work but to support someone
they know, they might respond
to what they see: the person instead of the role.
They do not see the work
(which is not just the writing,
but the performance as well) as
something of its own; they see
only people they know doing
things they disapprove of.
So is perhaps community theater not the place for new work?
It should be; it is ideal for
playwrights to premiere pieces
in their own community. Particularly in a smaller place, the
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VERMONT COMMUNITY THEATRE/COURTESY OF ZEKE HECKER
Louise Krieger as Helene and Kario Pereira-Bailey as Felix in The Lift.
actors are eager, the company
knows one another and are comfortable working together. The
author or composer is familiar
with the local talent and, if desired, may have a hand in the
production itself.
Still, the “community” in the
organization’s name seems,
at least in this case, to leave
the company vulnerable to the
threats and commands of an invisible and silent authority.
Kramsky was sufficiently disturbed by the threats to feel that
he had to comply for the good of
the cast and the VTC itself. As a
member of the company’s board
of directors, and the Brattleboro Union High School theater
teacher, he is already somewhat
response also indicates that people have been paying attention
to his past works and considering them.
Community theater is well
Of course, now a few hundred community members were documented as being the most
denied their chance to see this
widely attended venue for thenew play and decide for thematre in America. If theaters are
selves. A few hundred more who beginning to make the choice
were thrilled (or, at the very
to perform new works, and the
worst, indifferent) when they
audience is there, interested,
first saw it now can’t discuss the or at least willing to attend,
experience of having seen the
this should be an encouragshow with the friends and neigh- ing statistic for new and young
bors who otherwise would have playwrights.
gone but couldn’t.
And it could be, provided that
Hecker, the author and comthe interactions between composer, heard from many that The pany and community, artist and
Lift was his best work yet —
audience, allow for a dialogue,
which by his insistence includes and provided that neither conthe performance. He says this
demn the other to silence. n
more answerable to the community than another director might
be.
24
L ETTERS FROM READERS
Facing facts about nuclear power
W
Cars exiting the Interstate can see the Bellows Falls
mural.
Billboard law change a
victory for art, economy
O
n May 3, through the hard
work of Sen. Shumlin,
Representatives Obuchowski
and Partridge, and others, the
Vermont legislature included
language in the transpor tation bill to protect hand-painted
murals relating to Vermont’s
Designated Downtowns.
The amendment was carefully crafted to allow only
hand-painted murals, and
then only directly on the sides
of structures that have been
located in the same spot for
over 25 years. Any typography
on the mural may refer “only
to the direction, or distance to,
and the name of the designated
downtown.”
The Designated Downtown
program seeks to retain and
encourage the unique character of Vermont’s historic
town centers, but in recent
years, available grant monies
have largely dried up, and the
program has become more tenuous, even as our downtowns
have struggled to remain vibrant. With this amendment,
the legislature fosters two of
the strongest drivers to Vermont’s economic well-being:
creativity, and healthy towns
and villages.
The spokesperson from
the Agency of Transportation
has issued strangely alarmist
statements that that Vermont’s
revered Billboard Law is endangered and that a plague
of unsightly billboards might
start popping up along roadsides like mushrooms after
a rain.
A hand-painted mural on the
side of a barn uses an entirely
different artistic lexicon from
modern commercial signage.
The sad reality is that Vermont
highways suf fer enormous
actual visual blight from strip
development signage outside
all the state’s larger towns. The
idea that Frank Hawkins’s gorgeous nostalgic image on the
barn along Route 5 outside
Bellows Falls is more of a visual assault on the traveler,
and more wor thy of alarm,
than a string of blaring plastic
mass-produced signs for chain
motels and fast-food restaurants outside Brattleboro or
Rutland or Burlington beggars
the imagination.
The mission of the Bellows
Falls Downtown Development
Alliance is to promote our
downtown economy. If we can
do so by encouraging handpainted murals, and artistic
expression, that’s wonderful.
We strongly support the Vermont Billboard Law.
Most Vermonters I know
like hand-painted art, like their
downtowns, and like economic
development. We thank our
legislative delegation for furthering all three.
We hope to see you in Bellows Falls soon.
Charlie Hunter
Bellows Falls
Charlie Hunter serves as president of the Bellows Falls Downtown Development Alliance,
which commissioned the “See
Bellows Falls” mural. In the
recent story on the mural in the
context of the state’s 40-yearold anti-billboard laws (The
Commons, May), we reported
on a legislative remedy de signed to preserve this specific
signage. Our reporting was
correct when the newspaper
went to press, but by the end of
the legislative process, the law
also applied to other Designated Downtowns throughout
the state, as Hunter observes
in his letter.
ith all due respect to the
employees of Vermont
Yankee who work hard to operate the plant safely, it’s time we all
faced some difficult facts.
• Vermont Yankee is 36 years
old. It operates 20 percent above
original design capacity. It could
not be licensed to operate today.
It was 2007’s stor y of the year
largely because of a variety of
mishaps, including a cooling
tower collapse. More recently
we’ve had leaks in the condenser
and a gantry crane that malfunctioned, dropping a cask holding
68 spent fuel assemblies.
• VY routinely emits lowlevel radiation. No amount of
radiation can be considered safe,
according to the National Academy of Sciences. For tunately
for Entergy, the plant’s owner,
this radiation is colorless, odorless, and tasteless. A typical
1,000-megawatt plant contains
an amount of long-lived radiation
equivalent to 1,000 Hiroshima
bombs, according to Helen Caldicott, M.D., author of Nuclear
Power Is Not the Answer.
• VY’s spent-fuel pool probably puts us more at risk than
a potential core meltdown. An
NRC document, “Repor t on
Spent Fuel Pool Accident Risk,”
or NUREG-1738, found that containment structures such as VY’s
“present no substantial obstacle
to aircraft penetration.” And yet
the NRC has now okayed 48 out
of 48 nukes for 20-year relicensing, vulnerable spent fuel pools
be darned.
• VY’s spent-fuel pool contains 488 metric tons of highly
radioactive material. The NRC
estimates that a fire in VY’s spent
fuel pool would cause 25,000 fatalities over a distance of 500
miles if evacuation was 95 percent effective (which, of course,
it wouldn’t be).
• VY has other liabilities as
well. As part of its nuclear fuel
cycle, depleted uranium is produced, as is plutonium for nuclear
bombs. Depleted uranium, when
used in militar y munitions, is
classified as a weapon of mass
destruction, according to the
United Nations. It is illegal and
genocidal. No matter — we’ve
used 800 tons of it in Afghanistan, and well over 2,500 tons
in Iraq. Also, enough plutonium
was produced by U.S. reactors
in 2000, some 310 tons, to make
34,000 weapons.
• VY, like all nukes, produces
highly radioactive waste. It was
supposed to go to Yucca Mountain. It didn’t and won’t. Vernon
will host it, in all likelihood, for
hundreds of years.
Don’t look to nuclear power
as an answer to global warming.
The Rocky Mountain Institute
estimates that the cost of a new
reactor would be $2-5 billion.
An M.I.T. study determined it
would take 300 new reactors in
the U.S. (we now have 104) and
1,500 worldwide to make a significant impact on greenhouse
gas emissions.
It won’t happen. Wall Street is
not interested. Despite the hype
about a “nuclear renaissance,”
we’re witnessing a dying industry being kept alive by corporate
welfare from the federal government. The last nuke ordered by a
U.S. utility was TVA’s Watts Bar I,
which took 23 years to finish.
Globally, nuclear power has
been in decline since 1984, but
this hasn’t stopped the Bush
administration from asking
Congress for some $500 million in new cash for reactor life
support.
After 30-plus years and several
hundred billion dollars from taxpayers, the U.S. nuke industry
generates a mere 19 percent of
our electricity. Energy conservation and efficiency could easily
make up for that. In 1985, Forbes
magazine called the nuclear industry “the largest managerial
disaster in history.”
Building $5-billion nuclear
plants at a time when global
warming and peak oil are bound
to reconfigure society into more
localized bioregions is superfluous, morally unconscionable, and
environmentally indefensible.
It’s time to invest our resources
in promoting honestly safe, clean,
and green energy. We already
have the technology. We don’t
need to invent it.
If you are tired of worr ying
about some new Vermont Yankee accident and wondering what
you can do, don’t remain silent.
Silence gets interpreted as consent. Act 160 gives the Vermont
legislature the power to say no
to Entergy’s agenda to squeeze
more millions from their decrepit
plant until 2032. That vote will
happen in 2009.
You can help by joining one of
the Safe and Green citizen groups
being organized in Vermont, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire
towns that lie within Vermont
Yankee’s 20-mile sacrifice zone
by the Citizens Awareness Network (www.nukebusters.org)
and supported by other groups
like the New England Coalition
(www.newenglandcoalition.
org).
Safe and Green aims to put
pressure on our legislators,
Governor Douglas, and the Depar tment of Public Ser vice’s
David O’Brien to stop Entergy
Nuclear Vermont Yankee’s bid
to extend operations from 2012
to 2032, to conduct a truly independent safety inspection as soon
as possible, and to fully fund the
Decommissioning Fund.
And — most of all — to
promote safe, green, clean,
renewable, sustainable, and responsible energy for Vermont’s
future.
Bill Pearson
Brattleboro
Support nonprofits in VY fight
T
he Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) recently cited
Vermont Yankee for a security
violation that occurred in February. The NRC spokesperson
stated that the nature of the
problem will not be released to
the public due to post-9/11 security concerns. Though the NRC
has made it difficult to assess
how dangerous this particular
incident was, it is not difficult
to assess how dangerous the
ongoing operation of the plant
continues to be.
This aging and deteriorating
plant (one of the oldest still in
operation in the United States)
operates at 20 percent above
its original design capacity. The
high-level radioactive waste accumulating on the banks of the
Connecticut River will be deadly
for 250,000 years, yet the river is
used for fishing and recreation
and as a major irrigation source
for agriculture in New England.
As has been extensively documented, no nuclear power plant
in the countr y is adequately
protected from an attack by air.
Evacuation plans are inadequate.
Depleted uranium and plutonium
produced by the plant’s fuel cycle
can contribute to the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
There’s a need to formulate
a long-term energy policy that
originates with environmental
stewardship. Part of that stewardship involves what kind of
legacy we bequeath future generations. The kind of highly
dangerous legacy left by Vermont Yankee and nuclear plants
in general have no place in a plan
for a sane energy future.
The Ver mont legislature
will decide over the next year
whether this accident-prone
plant will be licensed to operate
for another 20 years. On the federal level, legal proceedings are
already under way with court
hearings in southern Vermont
July 21-25. The New England
Coalition on Nuclear Pollution, a
Brattleboro-based, membershipsupported nonprofit organization,
is intervening legally to oppose
the 20-year license extension.
Legal fees for this kind of
e f f o r t a r e e x t e n s i v e . Ta x deductible contributions can be
made by mail to NEC, P.O. Box
545, Brattleboro, VT 05301 or
through the group’s Web site,
www.newenglandcoaltion.org.
Ameila Shea
Peterborough, N.H.
Adding value to
wood products
I
thought that the article “Sawmills squeezed by multiple
economic factors” [The Commons, May] did read very well,
and you also got to talk to two
of the most knowledgeable
folks in the local wood products
industry.
I did notice, though, one error: when I was discussing the
“value added” concept of wood
products if kept in-state, I had
said that they can add up to 9-14
times their initial dollar values as
opposed to 9-14 percent.
William Guenther
Brattleboro
The writer is Windham County
Forester for the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation. The Commons regrets
the error.
The Commons • June 2008 Commons
The
Jeff Potter, Editor
Barbara S. Evans and Vincent Panella, Editorial Committee
———
This issue of The Commons is brought to you
by the hard work and generosity of:
Director of photography: David Shaw
Comics editor: Jade Harmon
Editorial and proofreading support: Vincent Panella, Bethany Knowles,
Kim Noble, Frederic Noyes, Connie Evans, Charles Dodge, Shoshana Rihn.
Technical/logistical support: Simi Berman, Trevor Snorek‑Yates,
Chris Wesolowski, Diana Bingham, Jim Maxwell, Bill Pearson,
Shana Frank, Roberta Martin, Janet Schwarz, Bill Lax,
Doug Grob, Mary Rothschild, Susan Odegard, Menda Waters.
An independent,
nonprofit newspaper
providing news and views
for, by, and about
Windham County, Vermont
Published by
Vermont Independent Media, Inc.
139 Main St., P.O. Box 1212
Brattleboro, VT 05302
(802) 246-NEWS
www.commonsnews.org
Without the support of all our
volunteers, this paper would still
live only in our imaginations.
EDITORIA L S
Home Depot ambiguities
W
e would like nothing better than to
think that Home
Depot couldn’t
make it here because small,
local, independent businesses
held their own.
Clearly, that’s a common
perception. A Boston Globe
headline recently proclaimed,
“In Vermont, small shops beat
Home Depot in customer battle,” and at least one nationwide
anti-big-box-store advocacy organization, bigboxtoolkit.com,
in a press release, claims the
departure owes “a great deal”
to Brattpower, the community
group that formed first to oppose Home Depot’s arrival in
2004 and then as a way to advocate and strengthen local
businesses.
Maybe. We are huge believers in keeping our business
local, but it would be irresponsible to draw those conclusions.
As an alternative explanation, consider that the company
aggressively opened new stores
until it hit a tipping point where
stores began to pop up close
enough that individual stores
began competing with one another for their own sales. A
Home Depot publicist so much
as admitted to that phenomenon, explaining with some
discomfort that the company’s
“strategy has changed,” emphasizing support for existing
stores rather than aggressively
opening new ones.
We know Home Depot wasn’t
meeting its “targeted returns”
on Brattleboro’s sales and those
of about a dozen other stores
now closing. We don’t know if
the company has adjusted those
targets to respond to a difficult
economy, if those sales figures
have even declined.
We don’t know if the Brattleboro Home Depot’s sales
headed up, down, or sideways,
and barring employees willing
to rat out confidential sales figures for a particular store, the
community will never know the
data and criteria that was used
to make the decision to leave.
Maybe, just maybe, Home
Depot’s sales have actually
been rising, as more cashstrapped consumers hit the
Brattleboro store purely on the
basis of price or thought twice
25
before driving to Keene or
Greenfield. Yet such increases
could still never approach the
targets the Atlanta-based corporation set as a benchmark
for deciding which operations
would make the cut.
That’s hardly a victor y for
shopping locally.
The point is: we just don’t
know. There is little to do but
sit back and watch people pick
at the stock until it’s all gone,
and then witness the un-building of a store.
And then what happens?
Will the largest retail space in
Brattleboro sit empty, grass
and weeds sprouting through
cracks in the parking lot?
Brattleboro Area Chamber of
Commerce Executive Director
Jerry Goldberg reports that “a
couple of groups have spoken
about the vacancy and have
probably considered the type
of installation that would be
most appropriate and effective
for the community,” he says.
Appropriate and effective by
whose standards?
The largest question of all:
When the store is closed, will
people hop in their cars and
drive to Keene, or will they
shop at a local alternative? You
can take Home Depot out of
Brattleboro, but can you take
Brattleboro out of Home Depot, at least those who liked the
abundance and price that such
a store can offer?
While the jury’s out on this
ambiguity, we can only recommend that all gloating and
notions of victory about Home
Depot’s depar ture cease —
not only for reasons of logic,
but for another simple reason
entirely.
With more than 80 of our
area’s citizens having lost jobs
or facing the prospect of long
commutes, with the largest retail space in town soon to be
vacant, nobody should really
be celebrating.
In memoriam
W
e write these
words on Memorial Day, which
should be a poignant reminder of the ultimate
sacrifice of brave men and
women who have defended
the United States throughout
our country’s history. Sadly,
what should be a somber day
of remembrance has become
another three-day weekend in
our frenetic society for far too
many people.
Citizens in this country exhibit a strange detachment
with the phenomenon that is
the war in Iraq. We have been
asked to do little if anything
of consequence to sacrifice
for this war. If we do not have
friends or relatives in harm’s
way, little in our day-to-day
lives reminds us of the human toll.
As of May 28, the Department of Defense counted
4,083 United States confirmed
military deaths in Iraq since
March 20, 2003. That’s 4,083
people who weren’t home this
Memorial Day enjoying barbecues and three-day sales, 4,083
people who weren’t worrying
about high gasoline prices or
the cost of food or whether
Barack Obama should wear
a flag pin or who should win
American Idol. It’s no comfort to the grieving families
of those 4,083 soldiers that
Iraq counts more than 40,000
police, military, and civilians
among its war dead since
2005, according to figures released by its government.
One of the latest casualties was one from the Green
Mountain State: Sergeant
First Class Jason F. Dene, 37,
of Castleton, Vt.
Over whelming evidence
has emerged over the years
from first-hand White House
witnesses (most recently,
one from former press secretary Scott McClellan) and
from journalists with integrity
that George W. Bush, Dick
Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld,
and their ilk misrepresented
this war and exploited a terrified post-9/11 public to
ramrod a longstanding neoconser vative agenda. We
now pay the price for those
unthinkable and unconscionable actions.
As we remember and honor
our military, which has fought
and died for our countr y’s
freedoms, that appreciation
is accompanied by raging
fury that by most credible accounts these freedoms were
never at stake in Iraq.
It is with deepest appreciation, admiration, and respect
for the commitment and loyalty of our armed forces that
we call on our readers to
join us in remembering our
military and honoring their
sacrifice by calling for an
end to this blindingly senseless war.
the dr awing board
Lee Sanderson (www.leesanderson.com), a freelance cartoonist, regularly contributes to the
Brattleboro Reformer and a number of other newspaper editorial pages throughout northern New
England.
SUDOKU
26
Classifieds
Classified ads are free, as space allows.
Submit to classifieds@commonsnews.org
or to P.O. Box 1212, Brattleboro, VT 05302.
Help wanted
FOR RENT
INSTRUCTION
NEwspaper delivery volunteers: The
Room for rent. B ig, sunny. Quiet country
Summer Art Classes at River Gallery
School: Make this your summer for ar t
Sign up now and get fresh, local veggies,
May - Nov. New Leaf CSA. Five minutes
from exit 3 in Brattleboro. (802) 254-2531
www.geocities.com/newleafcsa.
Oa k wo r k s m assag e ta b le w i t h
headrest. Aqua blue, excellent condition!
$300. 802-464-3260 or wpfield@sover.
net.
Nigerian Dwarf Goat kids for sale. Does
$275, Wethers $90. From a registered,
CAE-free herd. Call Elizabeth 254-2531.
4 rims/tires R185/80 R14 Off 1991 volvo
good tread $80 802-258-4841
FOR RENT
HOUSE SHARE: I am looking to share my
home with a roommate in a beautiful
area of Dummerston Center on 3 acres
of fields and woods. Your own private
space of 2 rooms, furnished or not, and
own bathroom. Share kitchen and living
spaces. Available 6/1. $475/month includes
heat, electric, parking in garage, laundry,
kitchen use, wireless high speed internet
access and cable TV. Good cell phone
reception. Must be OK with cats. Call Jean
802-257-5089.
MAIN STREET STUDIO APT FOR RENT:
Available immediately, studio apartment
on Main Street with recent updates. 1-year
lease, no pets, best for single occupancy.
$550/month. Call 802-380-4819 to view.
INSTRUCTION
REAL ESTATE
M u s i c i m p rov i s ati o n for a ll ages ,
CO-HOUSING: Caer Coburn, a traditional
instruments, and levels and types of musical
experience (including none). Individuals,
groups, gatherings, parties, classes. Also
instrumental lessons on flute and keyboard.
Heidi, 579-6397.
village based on co-housing and
intentionalcommunities, now forming
in Rockingham VT. Info: 802-463-1954,
stuart@caercoburn.org, www.caercoburn.
org
Kripalu YogaDANCe! Thursdays, 7-8 p.m.
resources
May 1-June 5 at the Marlboro Elementary
School on Route 9. Just minutes from West
Brattleboro. Dance barefoot through the
chakras to great soundtracks. Skill and
experience irrelevant! Session discounts,
bar ter, drop-ins welcome. $10 ($5 for
18-25/over 65). Certified Kripalu Instructor,
Kelly Salasin (kel@sover.net), 254-7724.
PIANO LESSONS: Also acoustic guitar and
5-string banjo lessons. Adults and children;
beginning and intermediate. Taught in the
West Dummerston Community Center.
Please call to arrange for one free trial
lesson. 802-258-2454.
DRUM LESSONS available: focusing on
correct posture, rudiments, rhy thmic
structure, tuning, and most importantly —
having fun! All levels and styles. For more
info Benjamin Carr, 802.258.2671.
GUITAR LESSONS: With Lisa McCormick. All
ages, all levels, all styles. Beginners welcome!
Also, songwriting, singing, banjo, bass,
performance coaching. Info: 802-254-5083,
http://Songwriters-Studio.Blogspot.com.
BREAK THROUGH ACTION BLOCKS: Get
out of stuck patterns; discover a new way
to deal with the challenges of relationship
through Experiential Focusing. Special offer:
Series of three guided sessions at $40/
session. Facilitated by a Focusing trainer
certified in 1998 by The Focusing Institute
in New York. Call 802-257-3099 or e-mail
genovefa@sover.net.
Drum Lessons for All Ages: Teacher with
over 25 years of experience now accepting
new students. Learn rock, latin and jazz in
a fun, relaxed environment. Will teach at
my home or yours. First lesson is free! Call
Henry @ 257-4185.
Northern Ne w England Poison
Center is available 24 hours a day, 7 days at
week at 1-800-222-1222 to answer poison
prevention questions or poison emergency
questions.
services
L i feARTS COAC H I N G: Pe r sonal L ife
Coaching with lifelong faciliators of growth
and learning. Get the insight, support and
accountability you need to: Achieve your
goals, Navigate transition, and Manage
your well being. You name it, we’ll work
toward it! Free 20 minute consultation.
Sliding scale $20-35 per session (pricing
effective through March ‘08.) References
available. Contact: Kelly Salasin, LifeArts
Coaching<kel@sover.net> 802-254-7724.
Are You Hungry?: Let me make your
workshop, seminar, camp or retreat a
delicious one! On-site catering for groups
large and small. I cook a wide array of
diverse and delectable whole foods, using
fresh local produce whenever possible.
Experienced in meeting a wide range of
dietar y needs and making the most of
your budget, I will work with you to meet
the unique needs of your group. Glowing
references available on request. Contact
me via email, at daliashevin@hotmail.com.
Available beginning April 2008.
PAINTING: interior/exterior, restorations
and revitalizing, best price, reliable, Miles
Levesque, 802-869-4222, Rockingham/
Walpole area.
monad
By Morgan Pielli
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SERVICES
volunteers needed
D esign, planting, and maintenance
Volunteers Needed: At Experienced
of gardens … mowing too! One time,
occasional, or regular services are available.
Do you want a new garden installed or do
you just need someone to weed, fuss, and
water while you are on vacation? I can do
it all; creative, inspired, flexible, and I do
heavy lifting. I am a very reasonably priced
gardener. Call today and your garden will
soon be glorious. 802-254-5918.
Stud For Hire: AKC Registered - Yellow
Labrador - OFA - Woodys Haven Kennels.
254-2455.
FULL SERVICE TREE CARE: Call All Seasons
Tree Ser vice at 802-722-3008 for free
estimates for tree removals, pruning and
a full range of tree care service. 30 years
of experience.
MAGICAL ENTERTAINMENT: The Great
Scot, Bardic Magician, will make your party,
festival, organization or special occasion
unique and fun. Will travel, testimonials
available. Info: 802-463-1954, greatscot@
greatscotmagic.com, www.greatscotmagic.
com.
Goods Thrift Shop for Brattleboro Area
Hospice, 77 Flat Street in Brattleboro. Please
stop by the Shop or call us at 802-254-5200,
to learn more. Ask for Victoria.
WANTED: African drummers interested
in collaborating with me to hold a sanskrit
chanting class. The yoga of devotion. Please
call Amy at 579-9511 to discuss possibilities.
Namaste.
35MM Cameras: If you have come to rely
Tarot Card and Astrology Readings WANTED: Outdoor sy couple seeking
Wellness Consultations — healing
through the use of foods, herbal remedies,
nutritional supplements and lifes tyle
approaches to improve energy, restful sleep
and overall health while reducing pain and
chronic dis-ease. For more information or
to schedule an appointment, please visit
www.wisdomofhealing.com or call Cindy
at (603) 997-2222.
www.marekbennett.com
northminster north
Antique / Vintage Bicycles. Single
speed. Schwinn, Elgin, Dayton, Colson,
etc. 1890’s thru 1950’s Balloon Tire Bikes.
Any condition. Make room in your barn or
basement. Top dollar paid!!! Please Call J.C.
or Jackie 802-365-4297.
jadecrystal.livejournal.com
stuff wanted. Also looking for tube powered
hifi equipment. Call 802-257-5835.
minimally heated storage space to
rent or buy, within walking distance of
downtown Brattleboro. Please contact
Donna at 802-380-6576,or PO Box 1652,
05302.
802-869-2799
You are looking at Windham County’s best advertising value.To promote your business in the next issue of
The Commons, call Ellen at (802) 246-6397 or e-mail
ads@commonsnews.org.
By Jade Harmon
significant other for warm, companionable,
long-term relationship. We are aging but
very healthy siblings -- a stunning longhaired calico and her short-haired tuxedo
brother -- who cannot make the transition
to a NYC apt. Will exchange f irst-rate
rodent control for a warm barn, daily food
and water and occasional human contact
on our terms. We absolutely cannot be
separated. Interested? Please call our
exasperating owner at 802.380.0794.
Old guitars, amps, mandolins, basses, hi-fi
This space for rent
By Marek Bennett
share my home in Dummerston Center.
Own private space of 2 rooms, furnished
or not, and own bathroom. $500/month
includes heat, electric, parking in garage,
laundry, wireless high-speed Internet access
and cable TV. Good cell phone reception.
Large yard. Must be OK with cats. Call Jean
802-257-5089.
calligraphy, illumination, illustration, graphic
artist, historical costumes, custom sewing
and design. Samples, pictures, testimonials
available. Info: 802- 463-2054, veda@
renaissance-artist.com, www.renaissanceartist.com.
for women. The readings promote increased
clarity, self-awareness, and empowerment
and offer positive, practical advice. $30 for
a 20-minute reading. Phone consultations
available MC/VISA. www.ameliashea.com
603-924-0056.
mimi’s donuts
Roommate: Looking for a roommate to
on your digital camera and don’t know
what to do with your perfectly good 35mm,
The In-Sight Photography Project would
love to have it. Insight teaches kids new
perspectives through the lens of a camera,
teaching communication skills and building
self-esteem. Visit www.insight-photography.
org, then contact Program Director Eric
Maxen, In-Sight Photography Project,
Inc., 45 Flat Street Suite 1, Brattleboro
VT 05301.
RENAISSANCE ARTIST: Veda Crewe Joseph,
www.colintedford.com
WANTED
ButterCup festiVaL
By David Troupes
SUDOKU solution
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Charlie Franklin 120, with 120 lb. hopper,
made in Alber t a . 2 year s old. Wellmaintained. Call soon to see it in operation,
as it will be disconnected soon. Classic black
with big window, puts out good heat. I have
all manuals. Electronic control panel. Will be
sold with my pellet supply included. $1700.
Call Mary for details, 869-6407.
7
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PELLET STOVE FOR SALE: Danson’s Cheap
8
4
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5
7
8
6
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4
cu. ft. Whirlpool with top freezer. About
10 years old, but in good working order.
Asking $250 or best offer. Call Priscilla @
802-387-5654.
By Colin Tedford
27
23
9
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Refrigerator for sale: Spacious 22
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medicine. Buy directly from local herbalist
and save.$6 per ounce. Custom formulas
also available Amy 802-579-9511.
7
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STAY HEALTHY: with local,organic herbal
GAIA’S CHILDREN NATURE ARTS CAMP
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$3000.HAYING EQUIPMENT HESTON
1010 HYDROSWING MOWER, works,
used this season. $500. HESTON 3700
TEDDER/RAKE $200. (802) 869-3062
in West Brattleboro. Beautiful woods and
gardens host our creative adventures with
sound, movement, music, dance, drawing,
painting, poetr y and stor y! Camps are
small and very creative, tailored to the
imaginations of the individual children
enrolled. Campers meet from 8:30–3:00
daily. For 5–7 year old children: July 7–11
and July 21-25. For 7–12 year old children:
June 23–27, July 14–18, July 28–August 1,
August 18–22 and August 25-29. Camp
tuition is $200 – $250 per week, with sliding
scales and bar ters welcome. Programs
are designed to support children’s natural
healthy development and attunement
with the Earth. TO register and for more
information, please call 802-254-1310
or e-mail lemorey@comcast.net. This
Program is sponsored by The Institute for
Natural Learning.
for kids
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Ford 3000 gas tr actor: Runs well.
making! River Gallery School is currently
enrolling for the summer semester with
classes beginning the week of June 30th.
Class offerings for adults include: Adult
Studio classes, Plein air Landscape Painting,
Life Drawing and Painting, Assemblage,
Dialogue, and Independent Study. Class
offerings for children and teens include: Tots’
class, Home Schoolers’ Class, Mixed Media
for Teens, and our community partnership
with Hilltop Montessori SummerFUN
program (5 – one week sessions which
begin the week of June 17th and runs until
August 15). Upcoming summer workshops
include Sequencing with Lydia Thomson
( June 14), Life Drawing Marathon with
Jason Alden (July 12), Percussion Instrument
Building with Ahren Ahrenholz and So
Percussion (July 19), and Pastel Painting
with Karen Baker (August 13). The River
Gallery School is a non-profit educational
organization that offers an in depth visual
arts program for young people and adults.
Call River Gallery School with any questions
or to enroll, 257-1577. You can also email us
at rgsart@sover.net . Visit our blog: www.
rivergalleryschool.wordpress.com.
COMICS
ComiCs
column, row, and 9-square box. There is only one solution. Do
not guess what numbers go where. You will find the answer by
using logic. Solution inverted at the bottom of the page.
5
9
6
1
7
4
3
8
2
For sale
road near exit 3. For one person. Share
living room, kitchen with young married
couple. High-speed internet. All utilities
included except phone. Avlb. 6/1. $500/
mo. 254-2531.
The Commons • June 2008 the
5
8
9
4
6
7
Commons seeks kind, hearty souls willing
to drop newspapers at places in your
Windham County town; commitment is
once a month, an hour or less, depending
on number of sites. Please contact Betsy at
info@commonsnews.org, or call 246-6397
for details.
The object of a Sudoku puzzle is to fill in the blank squares so that
each of the numbers 1 through 9 appears in every column,
row,WorLd
and
spinninG
SUDOKU
9-square box. There is only one solution. DO NOT GUESS what
object of a Sudoku
puzzle is toYou
fill in the
blank
squares
go where.
will
find
the answer by using logic.
Thesonumbers
that each of the numbers 1 through 9 appears in every
www.buttercupfestival.com
Vermont Cheddar
By Silvio Graci
28
The Brattleboro Food Co-op’s
OF
THE
The Brattleboro Food Co-op’s commitment to our community and our local producers.
Chase Hill Farm
Warwick, MA
R
oll a little bite of Chase Hill Farm’s
the assistance of the farm’s trio of Belgian mares.
Farmstead Cheese over your tongue to taste
Mark learned his driving skills with the Baileys at
the full nuance of the rich, creamy flavor
Fairwinds Farm in Brattleboro. Using horses instead
with a nutty finish. What you are enjoying is the
of tractors is all part of the organic, humane, and
exquisite result of Jeannette and Mark Fellows’
sustainable philosophy that informs every aspect
style of animal husbandry combined with their
of Chase Hill Farm. This approach is evidenced
cheese-making finesse (their Italian Grace cheese
by the fact that their veal calves live natural
took Second Place from the American Cheese
lives in pastures with their mothers, while all the
Society for its class). Their herd of Normande
replacement calves nurse naturally.
cows, crossed with their original small Holstein
The farm was originally bought in the fifties
and Jersey herd, produce a milk rich in butterfat
by Mark’s parents. After graduating in 1984
and protein that is ideal for making cheese, and is
from Cornell, where he met Jeannette, Mark took
the same breed used in France to make some of
over and started doing things his own way: from
the world’s most famous cheeses. Besides being
converting to seasonal, introducing the Normande
exceptionally beautiful with their red and black
cows, to being fully organic certified in 2002. The
mottled hides, Normandes are also excellent on
Fellows have no employees. Jeannette specializes
forage and as beef
cows, and so the
Meet Mark & Jeannette from Chase Hill Farm
Fellows are able to
at the Co-op, Friday, June 6, 3-7 p.m.
completely pasture
raise their animals on a
and sample their artisanal cheese.
natural seasonal cycle.
The cows calve in
the spring and the whole season starts with the cows
in the cheese making while Mark looks after the
eagerly gambling onto the fresh spring pastures
livestock and fields (though Jeannette likes to get
after a winter of hay harvested from the farm’s 264
out of the pristine cheese room and get some fresh
acres in Warwick, Massachusetts. Because of the
air on occasion). The house they live in is the same
intensity of their milk, even more nutritious and
one where Mark was raised.
rich for the pure grass diet, this seasonal system
You can find Chase Hill farm products in the
works wonders for the Fellows – allowing them
Cheese Department at the Brattleboro Food Co-op,
to make just as much cheese and sell just as much
the brand new River Valley Co-op in Northampton,
raw milk for a fraction of the cost of a conventional
Greenfield’s Market, McCuskers, Wholefoods in
operation – and they get three months a year to take
Hadley, Atkins in Amherst, as well as the Amherst
life just a bit easier.
Farmers’ Market, CSAs and local farm stands, as
Speaking of hay: that hay is produced with
well as at the farm itself.
co-opcalendar
June 2008
YOGA
Keeping and Restoring Healthy Bones
Every Wednesday, 12-1 p.m. $3
Prakriti Yoga Studio, 139 Main St., #701
Friday, June 6, 3-7 pm
Meet Jeannette and Mark Fellows from Chase
Hill Farm in Warwick, MA and sample their artisanal cheese.
Tuesday, June 24, 6-8 pm
Co-op Community Room, No Charge
This important class will give you real answers
to having healthy bones for a lifetime. Learn
how to choose and prepare mineral rich foods,
as well as which supplements really help to improve bone strength and flexibility. Please, bring
your teens! Registration is not required.
Fair Trade Sampling
Whole Foods Cooking Class for Adults
Thursday, June 12, 4-7 pm
Packham Pears from our produce
department grown in Ecuador
Tuesday, June 17, 5-7 pm
Co-op Community Room
Cost $7.00 per person – payment is made
directly to instructor at the start of class.
Ready for a change in your cooking and eating? Come prepared to learn new recipes for
cooking seasonal whole food. Sieglinde Joyce, a
holistic health counselor and nutritional coach
will show you how. Share a seasonal meal and
learn the benefits of eating whole foods. Please
Meet & Greet
Customer Appreciation Day—
Burgers for a Buck!
Saturday, June 21, 11:30 to 2 pm
Cooked by our department managers.
All proceeds go to help stock
the Drop–In Center’s food shelves.
call Sieglinde, 464-2846, with any questions.
Registration in advance is necessary by calling
the Co-op at 257-0236, x121.
Story-n-Snack
Story Time at the Co-op
Who: Open to children birth to five
and their caregivers
When: Every Friday from 10:30-11am
Where: The Kids’ Room at the Co-op
This event is free and open to the public.
Monday–Saturday 8-9 • Sunday 9-9 • 2 Main St., Brattleboro,Vermont • 802 257-0236 • www.brattleborofoodcoop.com
The Commons • A

A functional junction?

Transcription

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