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(05/14/20 9:53am)
A petition urging Middlebury College to partially refund students for the spring 2020 semester tuition has garnered just over 120 signatures since its release last week. Tamar Freeland, a Middlebury Language Schools Masters student based in Madrid, started the change.org petition. The petition comes a month after the college partially refunded up to $4,380 in room and board charges to residential college undergraduates.
Freeland was motivated to petition by what she considered to be shortcomings of the Middlebury Language Schools Spanish M.A. program in Madrid this spring due to remote learning guidelines. “My peers and I realized that the quality of our online classes was far below that of in-person classes,” Freeland said. She stressed that, even though professors remained the same and leadership was flexible with due dates and technological difficulties, students were not receiving all that they had paid for.
“[As] a masters student, my classes are supposed to be small discussion level courses,” Freeland said, mentioning that Zoom classes have made it difficult to break out into discussions with partners. “We are supposed to be engaging with each other, but even at my level, that’s not happening.”
After drafting a petition and seeking initial feedback from her peers in Madrid, Freeland published the petition online, directed to President Laurie Patton, Dean of International Programs Carlos Vélez and David Provost, executive vice president for finance and administration. Freeland has also sent a letter to the Office of the President with the same message. The college acknowledged Freeland, saying they would formally respond to Freeland’s request later this week.
In a statement to The Campus, the college stressed that this spring’s priority has been on student well-being and the quality of their education through remote learning guidelines.
“Our ability — in this unprecedented time — to provide continuity in teaching and learning is dependent on our existing revenue sources,” the statement read. “None is more crucial than tuition, which enables us to continue to pay the salaries of our dedicated faculty and staff through the academic year, and therefore we are not in a position to offer tuition refunds.”
Freeland’s petition comes in the wake of much larger student-led motions at other colleges and universities to have spring semester tuition partially refunded. In many cases, class action lawsuits have been filed by students against their institution, including schools such as the University of Vermont and Brown University. Freeland mentioned that while partial fee and tuition refunding is widely applicable to all universities, individual institutions need to consider their financial ability to offer refunds in the first place.
“These circumstances do genuinely represent an existential threat to certain colleges that may have to declare bankruptcy or even cease to exist altogether,” she said, citing the uncertain future of a handful of Vermont state colleges as an example.
“That is not the case for Middlebury and other small, elite private schools whose funding is not tied to state budgets and that have endowments of a billion dollars or more,” Freeland said. “For small, elite private schools, refusal to offer partial tuition refunds isn't a question of a lack of economic resources, but rather a lack of administrative will.”
(04/02/20 10:00am)
The Campus has been keeping track of restaurants and retail outlets in the town of Middlebury during Covid-19. Check below to see the status of town businesses.
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(03/20/20 11:49pm)
It was the same message, again and again: this is going to hurt.
Town businesses are now floundering amid the outbreak of Covid-19 in Vermont — and most recently in Addison County — triggering responses from the state government and from local institutions. Middlebury College’s decision to transition to remote-learning after an extended March break has sent many potential customers packing, interrupting the normal flow of business. Local events and gatherings have also been cancelled en masse, creating unprecedented disruptions to the town’s commerce.
Take-out only
On Monday, Governor Phil Scott ordered all restaurants and bars across the state to close by Tuesday afternoon. Many restaurants in Middlebury are now under financial pressure in the face of these mandated closures.
“We’re going through a mass layoff,” Nate Davis of The Mad Taco told The Campus in a phone interview Wednesday night. “We offered all of our staff unemployment. We took out a payroll loan in the chance that further layoffs occur.”
[pullquote speaker="Nate Davis, The Mad Taco" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]We’re going through a mass layoff. We offered all of our staff unemployment. We took out a payroll loan in the chance that further layoffs occur.[/pullquote]
The Mad Taco, which opened last November, offered its employees a return date of April 6, but Davis believes the closure will last longer.
“Covid-19 has affected us dramatically,” Davis said. “We are wearing gloves, we’re wearing face protection — business has dropped off significantly.”
Mad Taco moved to a take-out only service, which is permitted under Scott’s shutdown, as of 6 p.m. on Sunday. This allows local businesses to continue their operations while mitigating the health risks employees may face during the outbreak.
For anyone looking to order from local restaurants in the coming weeks, Davis has a few pieces of advice: “If you’re going to call into any restaurant, Mad Taco or otherwise, pay over the phone with a card,” he said, suggesting patrons wait outside and call the restaurant when they arrive. “The less contact points, the better off we all are.”
The Arcadian, Haymaker Bun Company, Sabai Sabai Thai and American Flatbread all announced on Wednesday that they will also be closing their dining rooms and will move to take-out service only. Among these cancellations, the Middlebury Farmers Market announced on Facebook that it plans to host its outdoor market on Saturday per usual, from 9–12:30 p.m at the Exchange Street location.
https://www.facebook.com/MiddleburyFarmersMarket/posts/1563021190520811
Empty rooms expected
Although recent state regulations have yet to target the hospitality industry, Middlebury Inn General Manager John Zahn made it clear that the regulatory impact has spilled over into his sector. The Middlebury Inn closed in-person dining services at Morgan’s Tavern, the restaurant attached to the Inn, earlier this week, although it allowed customers to order food to their rooms.
Zahn said that with the closure of Morgan’s Tavern, lots of employees lost hours of work. “We’re hoping the ban doesn’t go past April 6,” he said. “We are trying to help [our employees] as much as possible.”
The inn is still offering rooms as usual, according to Zahn. Although the spring time is not their busiest season, Zahn noted that the inn receives lots of business from college parents travelling to and from athletic events, as well as for graduation in May. Zahn expects to lose customers due to the outbreak.
“It is very painful for our business, but our owners are committed and they want to do what’s right for the community and what’s right for employees,” he said. “We’ll just try to survive and hope the government helps with low interest loans.”
Zahn said that the outbreak of Covid-19 has been one of the most drastic events to the hospitality industry in his lifetime, along with the Gulf War and the fallout from the September 11 terrorist attacks. “I’m hoping that this is more short-term than those were,” he said.
Quiet aisles
Middlebury’s retail businesses also expect to suffer a lack of customers. Neat Repeats on Route 7 announced on Monday that it will be closed until the end of the month. The Makery, located at Hannafords Market, announced it would be closed until further notice as well.
Middlebury Discount Beverage owner Joe Cotroneo said in an interview last week that although he is lucky to have a mix of town and college customers, many retailers in town rely heavily on college patrons to support their businesses.
“With the months of April and May without sports, and without parents coming up on the weekend, that will be huge for some businesses that rely on just college business,” he said.
Dan McIntosh, owner of Forth N’ Goal on Main Street, told The Campus that the store will remain open unless forced to close.
“Sales will be down,” McIntosh said. “We are seeing lots of internet sales on our MiddleburyShop.com website, and it seems like maybe some parents or alumni who aren’t coming to town are shopping on our website. Hopefully, that will help us stay in business.”
For McIntosh, his biggest worry is the potential cancellation of Middlebury’s summer programs.
“The summer school is the most important piece of money that comes to the town of Middlebury during the whole year,” McIntosh said. “The summer school spends more money than the regular school — they come into town. They eat at the restaurants.”
Middlebury College has not announced any plans to cancel the 2020 Summer Language School session.
Performances postponed
Events spaces hosting events, pop-up stores and workshops, such as Bundle, have seen major cancellations and postponements for the month of March and April. Carrie Root, a local stain glass artist and Bundle’s interim-manager, says that the event-space non-profit began canceling events last week. This included her series of stained-glass workshops that was set to be held this Friday.
“Last week, I had to call it,” Root said. “Financially, it was a real hit,” she said, mentioning that she runs workshops after the holiday season due to slow sales.
A Middlebury College musician and high school student performers were among the Bundle cancellations. For an organization that books events 60 days out, Root said that management will have to wait to see what the outbreak does before they can reschedule events.
“The premise of Bundle is to connect community members and businesses, which is something that can’t happen right now,” she said. “We hope to come back when this is all over and still support small businesses and artists and the local community.”
For a complete list of Middlebury Businesses and their current status, visit experiencemiddlebury.org.
(03/11/20 2:56pm)
Middlebury Discount Beverage Owner Joe Cotroneo heard something unusual from a customer on Tuesday at noon.
“I was going to sit down and do paperwork when one kid came in,” Cotroneo said. “He said, ‘You’re going to get slammed, the College is ending classes.’”
He was right.
In the immediate wake of the college’s announcement that it was transitioning to remote learning after an extended March break following Covid-19 concerns, Discount Beverage saw customer sales increase to 50–60% higher than normal, according to store management.
“It was insane for two hours straight,” Cotroneo said. “There was a line all the way back to the cooler.”
Within the two hours after the college announced the scheduling changes, Cotroneo said he sold out of 30-count packages of Keystone Light Lager Beer, which is heavily stocked at the store. Cotroneo also sold a handful of kegs, and said that packages of White Claw Hard Seltzer were also popular. “I’ve been working a lot on Friday and Saturday nights, and it felt like that, but it’s a Tuesday at 1 p.m.”
Cotroneo, originally from the New York area, said he has never seen a sales spike like this in the 19 years he’s been in charge of the store.
“I can’t remember anything like this, nothing like a light switch,” he said.
The Campus also reached out to Hannaford’s Liquor Store about liquor sales, but they could not be reached for an interview.
(11/14/19 6:03pm)
Hidden among the grey folds of the Freeman International Center — a bunker-like building known for its brutalist exterior — the YouPower spinning studio might just be a quintessential “diamond in the rough.” The blacked-out 1500 square foot studio has everything you’d expect in a fully-functioning “soul-cycle”-esque pain-cave: riders in bright lycra uniforms, massive speakers, racks of spin shoes, colored dumbbells, folded towels, floor candles, and, in the middle of it all, 22 well-oiled spin bikes.
“Once you get to the studio, the instructors do everything,” said YouPower co-president Anna Hubbell ’19.5, who teaches classes on Monday afternoons and Tuesday mornings. YouPower offers over 19 cumulative hours of instructor-led spin sessions every week, an activity that promises enough EDM and sweat to last you the entire semester.
However, the YouPower of today is unlike what is used to be. The idea to turn the Freeman International Center space into a spin studio was conjured after the organization’s original concept came to fruition — a project to increase energy awareness on campus. In 2012, a group of Middlebury students received money to create a spin-bike system that stored energy in a generator. At the time, YouPower leadership led events like Watt-a-thons, where participants tried to produce as much power as possible in a session. After a few years, however, this initial experiment died out, as the power-generation component of the studio became less of a focus. YouPower’s advisor, Franklin Dean-Farrar, cited that the spin bikes were able to generate an underwhelming amount of energy, which led to disinterest. The studio then became, in essence, a satellite workout room where students could spin when they wanted to without trekking to the athletic center.
“The YouPower room really provided, and still provides, a workout space across campus,” said Dean-Farrar, who has been involved with the organization since its founding. Both Dean-Farrar and Hubbell stressed the importance of the studio being across campus from the athletic center.
“The founders thought it would be a good idea to keep it on the other side of campus as an alternate space for people who didn’t feel comfortable going to the gym or for people who live far away from the athletic center,” Hubbell said.
YouPower was still undergoing drastic changes when Hubbell and co-president Andi Evans ’19.5 became involved with the organization. It was moving towards a more organized form of spinning, one that involved instructor-led classes, loud music, and a brand that focused on personal development and well-being. This is the YouPower of today.
INCREASING POPULARITY
In the last few years, YouPower ridership has increased significantly.
“YouPower has become more of a household name across campus,” Hubbell said, citing the increased number of riders and instructors involved since she came to Middlebury College. “It’s been really exciting seeing a ton more students walk in through the day, and seeing full and waitlisted classes. YouPower is definitely on peoples’ minds as a way to work out during the day.”
Isla Bowery ’20.5 said that she started spinning her sophomore year, and since has regularly attended YouPower sessions multiple times a week.
“There was a learning curve [at first],” she said, “but you just have to jump into the deep end.” Bowery said that even though she felt a little intimidated at first, she enjoys the fact that in the studio you can still concentrate on your own performance. “Everyone is so focused on their [own riding]; you’re not in a spotlight like you are in the weight rack in the gym,” she said.
One reason for YouPower’s increased success as a spin studio has been the recent efforts by leadership to decrease financial barriers to entry. Recently, YouPower’s $17,000 annual budget has been used to buy new spin bikes and buy equipment for participants to use. In the summer of 2018, the studio received a donation of around 40 pairs of spinning shoes.
“As presidents, Andi and I have tried to make YouPower accessible for everyone on this campus,” Hubbell said. To further increase accessibility, YouPower has tried to get their name out into the campus community as a fully-equipped spin-studio free of charge. The group started going to club fairs in the fall of 2018, which Hubbell said has been a successful advertising strategy.
“When I started it wasn’t uncommon for less popular time-slots to only have three riders in the class,” she said, citing early morning and later afternoon classes as the most popular. “Now we are seeing those [unpopular] timeslots frequently fill up.”
Another reason for the popularity can be attributed to the collective and peer-to-peer nature of the activity, something the Dean-Farrar has witnessed as Assistant Director of Athletics for Operations and Events.
“What people are looking for is a lead-bike in the front of the room, loud music and an actual spin instructor leading the class,” Dean-Farrar said. He said there is something about group-led exercises, like YouPower, Middlebury Crossfit and yoga classes, that are popular at the college. “[Andi and Anna] have done a tremendous job with the organization,” Dean-Farrar said.
SPINNING CULTURE
YouPower has been acknowledged by some students for being intimidating, due to the fairly homogenous demographic that attends spin classes. Bowery said that she has seen more men attend classes recently, in an activity that is dominated by women. In October, the Local Noodle ran a satirical article that jokingly described YouPower as an organization that idolizes “super-hot blondes.” The Local Noodle declined to comment when asked about the motivation behind the article.
Hubbell stressed that inclusivity is one of YouPower’s top priorities.
“I want YouPower to continue to be a comfortable and welcomed space on campus, and this is something that can be constantly developed and thought about,” she said.
This year, nine instructors, or about 40% of YouPower’s leadership, will graduate, leaving a large opening for new initiative. Hubbell and Evans hope that new instructors will get involved and continue the club’s trajectory of the past several years.
“I want [YouPower] to continue to foster an environment where people feel welcome and supported and comfortable trying something new,” Hubbell said.
If there is anyone that would convince you to go to a YouPower spin session, ask Hubbell. As soon as she arrived to campus in the February of 2016, Hubbell began attending spin sessions in hopes of picking up a new athletic endeavor in lieu of tennis and field hockey, two sports she played in high school.
“After I went to a bunch of YouPower classes, I quickly realized I wanted to be an instructor,” she said. “I feel like I have a group of people to rally behind in place of being on a sports team.” As for getting new students to attend classes, she is really enthusiastic about spin. “Spin is the best workout you can ask for on a college campus,” she said. “All you have to do is get yourself there.” Likewise, Bowery praised spinning as a form of escapism. “Middlebury can be such a pressure cooker,” she said. “YouPower is very efficient and a very effective form of exercise.”
To sign up for spin classes, visit mindbody.io.
(11/07/19 11:03am)
Last summer, New Haven resident Taborri Bruhl, along with his son, drove 10,000 miles across the continental United States and back. The catch? They did it in a fully-electric Nissan Leaf. Instead of lifting gas pumps day after day, Bruhl mapped out electric charging stations across the country, which led them across Pennsylvania, the Midwest, up into Nebraska, down to Las Vegas and up the Californian coast. They completed a 10,000 mile round-trip in 44 days, and proved that a cross-country drive is possible in a fully electric vehicle (EV).
“In a few years, it will be easy to drive across the country in an EV,” Bruhl said. “My son wanted to do it now, when it is still difficult.”
Bruhl’s pioneering spirit is representative of the larger enthusiasm that has enveloped the budding electric-vehicle industry. In general, EV ownership in Vermont is on the rise. Just over 1,000 electric vehicles were registered in Vermont in October 2015. As of July, The Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles has over 3,200 EVs registered in state. Chittenden and Washington County have the highest EV ownership, with 78 and 70 EVs per 10,000 people, respectively. Addison County ownership is at 52 EVs per 10,000 people.
In towns across Vermont, including Middlebury, residents regularly attend workshops and clinics on electric vehicle ownership. Last Wednesday, Oct. 30 around 50 community members attended an EV workshop put on by Acorn Renewable Energy Co-Op. Among the speakers were Dave Roberts of Drive Electric Vermont, Taborri Bruhl, and Suzy Hodgson and Ben Marks of Acorn Renewable Energy. In a later interview, Roberts said that Drive Electric Vermont has been running workshops on electric vehicles for seven years.
“Folks [in attendance] are usually environmentally-conscious and early-adopters of new technologies,” Roberts said. “However, we are seeing more people who are just interested in electric vehicles, and those being driven by the economics.” Roberts cited spiking gas prices in recent years as reasons for the increase in public interest in alternative-fuel sources.
Yet, there are still plenty of setbacks with electric vehicle ownership. A 2019 report by the Vermont Public Utility Commision listed three major adoption barriers including, “…the price of new electric vehicles, the perceived limited distance that an EV can travel on a single charge, and the limited availability of public charging locations.” Roberts said that his priority is giving people information to make their own decision on whether or not EV ownership is right for them.
“Our goal is that people have the facts,” he said. “We are EV advocates, and of course we want more people driving electric cars. But we also realize that buying a car is probably the second or most expensive thing they will buy in their life.” At the workshop, Roberts highlighted federal-level financial incentives for an EV purchase, as well as the growing availability of fast-charging stations across the United States. Bruhl mentioned tools like Plugshare that he relies on to find charging stations on extended trips.
Roberts also brought up specific concerns with electric vehicles in the northeast.
“The most common Vermont-specific concerns are performance in cold weather and the amount of traction and ground clearance,” Roberts said, adding that cold weather conditions can reduce electric-charge by 20–40 %. “If you live on a dirt road in the country or a steep road, people [want to know] what models will just get them home. We continue to struggle with good options for people in those situations.”
Although Bruhl’s experiences with electric-vehicles have been great, he says an EV won’t always align with everyone’s lifestyle. “If you’re just driving in town, EVs are great,” Bruhl said. “But you if you want to travel in an electric vehicle, there’s a lot to figure out.” Bruhl said things like being comfortable with computers, operating and finding charging stations and understanding electric-charging rates are all important in operating an EV. However, he estimates a tipping point in the EV industry soon that will make EV ownership simpler.
(10/17/19 10:02am)
Think drip coffee, espresso, lattés and cold brew. Among the café classics offered at Royal Oak Coffee on Seymour Street, owners Matt and Aless Delia-Lôbo stock something that might be unfamiliar to customers: CBD oil.
Since its founding last May, Royal Oak Coffee has offered hemp-extracted cannabidiol (CBD) as an addition to any of their coffee brewed in-house. According to the Food and Drug Administration and the Harvard Medical School Blog, CBD is a non-psychoactive phytocannabinoid found in cannabis that has been gaining popularity within the food industry in the last few years for its physical calming effects.
The Delia-Lôbos offer Elmore Mountain Therapeutics (EMT) CBD oil, which is dosed using a graduated syringe and mixed directly into drip-coffees or espresso drink after brewing.
“Right now, we are focusing on seeing if the community is into CBD,” Matt Delia-Lôbo said. “It seems like it hasn’t caught on yet, but CBD is also not going away soon.”
CBD has less than .3% THC — the psychoactive chemical in weed — by volume, which means the product does not get you “high.” Although it has no intoxicative effects, many coffee shop owners and CBD vendors in the area attest to the relaxing effects that occur after ingesting CBD.
Ashley Reynolds of Elmore Mountain Therapeutics (EMT), a vendor of medical grade cannabidiol products, said that CBD can help regulate the body’s endocannabinoid system, which is important in times of stress, for example.
“Most peoples’ endo-cannabinoid system needs a reset of some kind,” Reynolds said. “In a normal situation we have naturally occurring cannabinoids going around our system, but if we aren’t taking care of [ourselves], our body is put into an unregulated system.”
Reynolds said that adding CBD to your diet can better regulate your own naturally occurring cannabinoids. “Supplementing [your diet] with phyto-cannabinoids found in hemp plants, like CBD, unlocks your body’s ability to get a boost to natural endogenous cannabinoid structure,” she said.
Since most people consume coffee in the morning, Reynolds said taking a dose of CBD at this time is a great way to get more cannabinoids in your system as an organic part of your daily routine.
“Some folks don’t like that herbal floral cannabis-taste,” she said, “so coffee is a nice way to get [CBD] into the body in a really enjoyable way.” EMT partners with cafes across Vermont and the north-east, including Royal Oak Coffee, to offer a single dose and low entry cost CBD oil.
As a new company, Royal Oak is still exploring how well CBD-infused coffee is being perceived by its Addison County customer base. East of the Green Mountains in Woodstock, Vt., Abracadabra Coffee Co. has successfully produced and sold a cold brew coffee with full-spectrum CBD oil. Dubbed the “Chill Brew,” Abracadabra has offered the product since its opening in 2015.
“[Chill Brew] sales have been great,” said Abracadabra business partner Sarah Yetter. “The product was really well-received and we’ve gotten international attention because of it.”
Yetter said that although some people think the calming effect of CBD and the alertness of caffeine oppose each other, the combination works well. “We like to say that it makes you calm and alert,” she said. “It doesn’t cancel each other out and gives you the best of both worlds.’
Abracadabra receives all its full-spectrum CBD from Luce Farms up the road in Stockbridge, Vt. “[Luce] does everything right, top to bottom,” Yetter said. “We would much rather use a Vermont product with people that we know and like than importing from a farm somewhere else.”
For the Delia-Lôbos, the flavor of their coffee is important to their company’s mission. They said the citric components of the CBD oil can work well with the fruity notes of drip coffee. Royal Oak houses a special syringe that measures CBD oil by volume, so that each coffee has the same amount added.
Lost Monarch, the sister company of Royal Oak Coffee, set to open later this month, will stock Abracadabra Coffee Co. products, including the Chill Brew. Royal Oak Coffee is open weekdays from 7 a.m. – 4 p.m. (excluding Tuesdays), Saturdays from 8 a.m. – 4 p.m., and Sundays from 9 a.m. – 4 p.m. Abracadabra Coffee Co. is open weekend days from 9 a.m. – 2 p.m., with rotating food trucks every week.
(10/03/19 10:40am)
Activists flocked to the Merrimack Generating Station on Saturday, Sept. 28 to protest the station’s continued use of coal fired steam generation. One of the last major power plants in the Northeast to use coal fuel, Merrimack Station has been frequently protested by environmental activists for the last year. Middlebury students in attendance were Asa Skinder-Richardson ’22.5, Cooper Lamb ’22.5, Caleb Green ’19.5, Malia Armstrong ’22.5 and many others. No Middlebury students were arrested.
Protest organizers included the Climate Disobedience Center (CDC) and 350 New Hampshire, with affiliates like 350 Vermont, Vermont Climate Strike and Middlebury College’s Sunday Night Environmental Group (SNEG).
Among the hundreds of demonstrators present on Saturday, the most significant were a group of activists that trespassed onto the station’s property in an act of civil disobedience. Many of them acted in collaboration with the #BucketbyBucket No Coal No Gas campaign, under which most were suited up in Tyvek suits carrying five gallon buckets with the goal of collecting buckets of coal. In mid-August, activists removed 500 pounds of coal from Merrimack Station and dumped it at the New Hampshire State House to increase political action against the plant.
On Saturday, Bow Police heavily enforced the station’s property boundaries, and 67 participants were consequently arrested for criminal trespassing, according to a Press Release from the Bow Police Department late that afternoon. Arrests were made between 1:30 and 3:30 p.m with no injuries or damages reported.
EMMANUEL TAMRAT
Around 300 demonstrators gathered at the edge of the Merrimack Station property, engaging in song and speech. They stood in solidarity with those risking arrest on Saturday.In an act of solidarity with activists risking arrest, a group of 300 people gathered by Merrimack Station’s gate. Among the participants were several Middlebury students, including Claire Contreras ’22.5 and Cora Kircher ’20. Both said that the gathering was as much about demonstrating solidarity with those risking arrest as it was about celebrating the movement towards ending the use of fossil fuels.
“A lot of the energy was channeled into making the environment feel supportive for people who were putting themselves at risk in a pretty scary way,” Kircher said. “It was also part of a larger celebration too.”
Contreras felt similarly. “It was pretty inspiring seeing people come from all over the east coast,” she said. “There was a lot of singing and chanting, amazing speakers, [and] a sense of solidarity for the people putting themselves on the line for a cause we all believe in- which is to end the age of fossil fuels.”
Protests lasted through mid-afternoon, with riot police present to control those attempting to further trespass. “The images of [the protests] speak for themselves,” Kircher said. “I personally had never seen that big a police force for an action that was nonviolent. It’s mindboggling that they hired two helicopters, a private security force and had state police in riot gear to take down people in white suites protesting injustice.”
In a statement released from Bow Police, Chief of Police Margaret Lougee said: “The Town of Bow would like to thank our local, county, regional and state partners for their assistance in ensuring that safety remained the top priority for our community, and all those who gathered at the Merrimack Station.”
Granite Shore Power, owner of Merrimack Station and four other generating stations in New Hampshire, said in a press release that although they support the views of those demonstrating, Saturday’s trespassing was seen by them as an act to make a scene. Merrimack Station is the largest of all five owned by Granite Shore Power, with full operating power at 482 MegaWatts. Granite Shore Power did not respond to The Campus’ request for a further statement.
Saturday’s protest capped a week of climate striking across the U.S., including climate strikes on Friday, Sept. 20 in Vermont towns and cities such as Brattleboro, Burlington, Lyndon, Middlebury and Montpelier.
(09/26/19 10:00am)
When Levins shot a gun for the first time at the age of 13, she didn’t know what to expect. At a three-day summer sports camp in Craftsbury, Vt., Levins was handed a .22 caliber sport rifle in an introductory clinic to the biathlon — the Olympic discipline that combines lung-busting nordic skiing laps and technically challenging shooting. Levins had nordic skied for many years in her homestate of Vermont, but had never tried this multidisciplinary sport — and had never even thought about shooting a rifle. That day, Levins fired one for the first time.
“There wasn’t as much kick as I thought there would be,” Levins recalled, as she sat in the lobby of Middlebury’s Athletic Center on the second Friday of September. “I remember watching movies with these giant machine guns kicking back at you, but [sports rifles] are not like that at all.”
At camp that summer, Levins realized that the elements of shooting — the necessity for focus and control — were athletic qualities that would complement the sport of nordic skiing that she already loved.
“I could see immediately how the biathlon would challenge my mind and not just my body,” she said.
STRONG HEART,
STEADY HAND
Fast forward seven years to today. Levins is a senior at Middlebury College, but her endeavors with the biathlon have spanned way beyond the scope of collegiate athletics. Levins is currently featured on the international stage, competing as a member of the U.S. national team in two circuits across Europe and the United States. She currently races with a host of other Vermont natives, including Emily Dreissigacker from Morrisville, Susan Dunklee from Barton and Bates College alumnus Hallie Grossman from South Burlington.
Although Levins’ success in biathlon would come within less than a decade after her introduction to the sport, the foundations of her athletic career were built at a young age. Her father, James Levins ’75, raced on Middlebury’s alpine ski team, and her parents moved their family to Rutland, Vt. right after Levins was born to raise her and her three siblings in a better skiing environment. Chloe Levins started competing in nordic skiing events at the age of four.
“My dad supported my siblings and me in nordic skiing, but taught us how to alpine ski as well,” she said. “My earliest memories are of skiing with my family near our home in Vermont. My dad used to pull me along while I hung onto his poles so I could keep up with my older siblings.”
During high school, Levins raced for Rutland’s nordic team in her freshman and sophomore years. She maintained focus on riflery on her own until her junior year in 2015, when she qualified for her first international biathlon competition. That winter, she competed in the Baltic Cup in Sweden and the Youth World Championships in Belarus. Thus began her career as a biathlete on the world stage. The next year, as a youth competitor, Levins placed fourth in pursuit at the Youth Biathlon World Championships in Slovakia. In 2018, at Junior Worlds, Levins placed sixth in pursuit and seventh in sprint. The next year, she placed 10th in pursuit.
Although Levins joined Middlebury’s nordic ski team a few weeks into her freshman year, she quit almost immediately. Instead of racing nordic for Middlebury, Levins has taken every winter term between the fall and spring semesters to race the biathlon internationally.
“Biathlon removes me from a lot of the ‘college scene’ of Middlebury,” she said. “Most of my free time is spent driving to training, traveling or catching up on work.” When she is at Middlebury, Levins trains twice a week in Jericho, an hour north of Middlebury.
Algis Shalna, who coaches Levins in biathlons, can testify to her discipline.
“Chloe is probably the best [biathlete] I have ever coached,” Algis said. “She’s the most dedicated, the most passioned, with very high discipline and unbelievable self-drive to be the best she can be.”
Levins also shows gratitude for how her hard work has paid off.
“I consider myself extremely lucky to get the opportunity to travel throughout Europe in the winter,” Levins said. “Traveling during the school year is difficult, but the rush I get while competing in a sport I love with Team USA on my back makes it all worthwhile.”
Levins says some of the most exciting moments in the sport occur when she is coming into the shooting range after a nordic skiing lap for a round of target shootings.
“You’re skiing as hard as you can. Usually my heart rate is 180–190. We come into the range and focus on our breathing and relaxation, and we do body scans,” she said. “I have pinpoints on my body that I choose to relax: my neck, where the gun rests in my right shoulder and my right forearm.”
Levins will focus on the five targets that she has to hit. She has only five rounds, and for every target she misses, she has to do an extra penalty lap.
“It’s just the best feeling to see the target go from black to white when you shoot,” she said.
IRONS AND GREENS
In addition to her Nordic career, Chloe Levins is also a nationally-acclaimed golfer and the current captain of the Middlebury College golf team. Most recently, in early August, Levins beat out over 40 other competitors for first place in the Vermont State Women’s Golf Association (WGA) amateur championship at the Ralph Myhre Golf Course in Middlebury.
Levins’ golf career started at a similarly young age as when she began nordic skiing, because her mother was a professional golfer.
“She taught all of us how to play golf when we could walk,” Levins said. “I didn’t go to preschool or anything, I would just go play golf with her, hold a club in one hand, and try to keep up.”
Levins started competing in golf tournaments at a young age as well. In high school, she won three state golf championships. Her winning streak continued at Middlebury. In her first semester at Middlebury, Levins won the NESCAC Championships at Ralph Myhre Golf Course by six strokes, and won again her junior fall by four strokes. Last spring, at the NCAA Championships in Houston, Texas, Levins placed 18th out of 131 competitors.
This summer, before the WGA championship, Levins was preparing for an average result. “I didn’t have any expectations going into the match. I wasn’t nervous but I was preparing myself for any sort of play. I was expecting to play worse than I did. I was a little too comfortable on the last day, so it got really close at the end. It was a good warmup tournament for the fall season.”
The Middlebury golf team has had three tournaments so far this season with the George Phinney Jr. Golf Classic this coming weekend. NESCAC qualifiers will be hosted October 5–6 at Williams College.
HABITS OF SPORT
Levins often receives comments that golf and the biathlon are so different that there is no crossover between the two sports. Levins disagrees with this sentiment, at least partially.
“Golf is much more mentally difficult because you can take as much time as you need [for a shot],” she said. “In golf, there are also so many more variables in conditions, weather, etc. … Managing variability is a skill I take from golf and apply to biathlon.”
Still, the biathlon carries its own set of mental challenges. For Levins, the biathlon is a sport where you can get ahead of yourself and not focus on the presence of the competition.
“It is easy to make if–then statements about if I do this right, then I can win this section of the race,” she said. “With the biathlon, you just need to stay present.”
Levins will continue to compete at Middlebury during golf season, and internationally in the biathlon come winter. Outside of the greens and tracks, Levins is a pre-med neuroscience major. One of the biggest struggles about dedicating a large portion of her time to athletics is that college can be a place of distraction and difficulty. “Being a student–athlete at Middlebury requires ridiculous timemanagement skills,” she said. “Every day of the week is planned out to the minute in order to maximize productivity.”
Additionally, she said her parents helped her remain focused on her athletic endeavors.
“I think my parents did a really good job of instilling hard work and joy in me and my siblings,” she said. “Now being outdoors and exercising and challenging my mind has just become a habit I continue to enjoy because of how I was raised and where I grew up.”
(09/12/19 10:02am)
In recent months, the Addison County Regional Planning Commission (ACRPC) has worked to gauge local communities’ critiques of the proposed Triangle Bike Loop, an initiative to update a network of roads between Middlebury, Vergennes and Bristol in order to further accommodate cyclists. Three weeks ago, on Aug. 15, the ACRPC held an Open House outside the New Haven Town Hall, where locals showed up to look at maps of the route and offer their opinions.
Mike Winslow, transportation planner for the Addison County Regional Planning Commission, estimated around 55 people attended the event.
“The plans were very well perceived [at the Open House],” Winslow said. “Folks were able to provide some input as to their preferred routes and identify any locations along the routes that were worth visiting or areas that needed particular focus for future upgrades to make them more walk-bike friendly.”
Winslow also said there has not been much criticism of any sections of the bike path plans so far.
“People have been very receptive,” he said. “This might be because we have been really good about reaching out to bikers and walkers. The bikers are very excited.”
In a summary of the event written by the SE Group, the project’s lead consulting firm, attendees pointed out around 15 points of interest on the proposed routes, including resources like public bathrooms and the Frog Hollow Bikes shop in Middlebury, and a farmer’s market and ice cream shop in Vergennes. A few attendees noted proposed roads that were too busy, including Route 17 and Route 116. The majority of attendees said they would use the bike path for recreational riding and commuting, and prefer paved roads to dirt roads. There were also six additional roads proposed by attendees to add to the route.
Next steps for the project include finalizing a proposed route, which is the job of the SE Group, the consulting firm that is spearheading the project. Winslow said the SE Group is “reviewing traffic and safety data to make their recommendations.” In terms of infrastructure, Winslow said the SE Group is investigating things like large road signage, fog lines on roads, and widening dangerous sections of road.
There is still opportunity for community members to offer opinions and criticisms on the Triangle Bike Path loop website. Community members are encouraged to take the bike path survey.
Another open house event may occur, with a date and place to be determined. The ACRPC continues to develop the Triangle Bike Loop project under the help of the SE Group Consulting Firm this fall, and hopes to finalize a route proposal by February 2020.
(05/02/19 10:32am)
It was mid-afternoon when David Cohen ’20 got the call. Two automobiles on a Vermont state highway had collided head on. One of the victims was still pinned in the driver’s seat, the car’s dashboard compressed on her lower body.
“I got suited up into the extrication gear, and started to do a medical assessment on the victim,” Cohen recalled. “She was talking to me and I was doing my best to calm her down, but there were people with big tools shouting at each other trying to cut metal apart. She was scared.”
After assessing the victim for several minutes, Middlebury EMS cut through the vehicle’s roof and lifted the driver up and out onto a stretcher. Cohen watched it all unfold: the ambulance quickly left for Porter Hospital, later transferring the victim by air to the University of Vermont Medical Center (UVMMC).
Cohen cites this story as his most memorable experience while working for the Heavy Rescue Team with the Ambulance Association in Middlebury. Raised in Princeton, New Jersey, Cohen worked with Princeton EMS during his time in high school. Now a junior at Middlebury, studying mathematics and physics, he volunteers his time for emergency services in town.
Cohen’s experiences are paralleled by those of a handful of other Middlebury students, who most commonly work shifts as first responders for Middlebury EMS and fire. Since 1970, the town of Middlebury has operated its own emergency medical response service, originally manning a single ambulance under the Middlebury Volunteer Ambulance Association (MVAA). Now, Middlebury Regional Emergency & Medical Services (MREMS) operates multiple ambulances and relies on upwards of 40 volunteers to operate their station off of South Street Since 1808, Middlebury has also maintained a local fire department under the Battell Hose Company. Until 1920, the organization had trouble recruiting and maintaining volunteers and other resources. Currently, Middlebury Fire relies on its 35 volunteers, and responds to emergencies across the county.
Liam Hahn ’21.5 volunteers his Wednesday nights as an overnight-shift EMT, and often finds himself awake in the early hours of Thursday morning. Hahn shrugged when asked about his Wednesday night sleep schedule.
“Some nights, we don’t get any calls,” he said. “Other nights, I don’t even touch my bunk.” As part of a team typically comprised of two primary EMT’s and a Middlebury student volunteer, Hahn has undergone extensive emergency training in order to respond to every call in the playbook, from a non-emergency patient transfer from Porter Hospital to UVMMC, to a homicide incident.
Hahn’s emergency medical experience started before he came to Middlebury. In his home state of Colorado, Hahn worked for ski and mountain bike patrol at Steamboat Resort for two years, responding to skiing accidents and emergency situations on the 2,900-acre trail system. Having obtained his EMT certification before his first year at Middlebury, Hahn was already prepared for his experiences as a responder here.
“My experiences at Steamboat have taught me a lot about working with a team,” Hahn said. “A lot of what we do [at Steamboat] relies very heavily on teamwork to get patients safely down the mountain. [Patrolling] has also taught me a lot of the little things that I can do to help either a Paramedic or an Advanced EMT so that they can focus on some of the more important interventions while I take care of [other tasks] within my scope of practice.”
Halcyon Brown ’21.5 is a volunteer firefighter at Middlebury Fire, and a member of their Technical Rescue Team.
“[Fire-fighting] crept into my mind, but I’m not really sure how it got there,” said Brown. “My uncle was a volunteer firefighter when I was a kid, so maybe I was getting subliminal messaging from a young age.”
Like all volunteers, Brown is on call 24/7, with a pager by her waist. When dispatch signals an incident, she needs to act quickly.
“I hear the tone, then run down the fire department. It’s a quick turnaround: you need to get your gear and headset on, and catch a truck,” she said. “It’s cool because you don’t really know where you’re going to go, nor what and where it’s going to be.”
Brown also commented on the minutemen-style of preparedness that so many rural fire departments rely on. “Most volunteers have other jobs. One guy is a mailman, another drives a tow truck, another a fuel truck, and I know someone who does woodworking on the side,” she said
For all student responders, emergency care ends when victims are brought to the hospital; it is not expected for first responders to cross paths with the patients again. For Cohen, the automobile collision victim was one of many routine faces he would never expect to see again.
On a non-emergency transfer call from UVM to a rehabilitation center in Addison County three weeks ago, Cohen noted something unique about the patient he was relocating.
“She mentioned she had been in a car crash, and her voice sounded familiar,” he said. “I put it together that it was the same person [from the highway accident]. I wasn’t expecting a positive outcome from the crash, but it was just awesome to talk to her, and to tell her I was the guy in the car. She didn’t remember me at all, but to see her fully on the road to recovery was the highlight of my EMS career.”
Cohen, Hahn and Brown plan to continue working for Middlebury EMS in their remaining time at Middlebury College. To learn more about Middlebury Fire and EMS, visit middlebury911.org and middleburyfiredept.org.
(03/21/19 10:36am)
MIDDLEBURY - Hundreds gathered at College Park in downtown Middlebury last Friday, March 15, to strike against government inaction on climate change. Middlebury Union High School students and college students alike walked out of class at noon, flocking to the Town Green. They were met by members of Addison County’s Interfaith Climate Action Network and other local climate activists including Bill McKibben, the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and founder of 350.org.
Strike organizers Cora Kircher ’20, Connor Wertz ’22 and Katie Concannon ’22 planned the event in solidarity with the hundreds of other Youth Climate Strikes happening across the globe that day.
In the midst of busy mid-day traffic, event organizers spoke through a blaring microphone while strikers held cardboard signs with phrases like, “Keep fossil fuels in the ground,” “Oceans are rising, so are we” and “Stop burning our future.” Many in attendance wore green and intermittently cheered throughout the event.
“I see a shift in how people are talking about [climate change],” said Warren Galloway ’21, who walked out of class that morning. “There’s more pressure against governments and bureaucracy, and holding people accountable, rather than just starting grassroot movements. I think people are starting to panic.”
Speakers included organizers Connor Wertz and Cora Kircher, Asa Skinder ’22.5 and Middlebury Union Alumna Greta Hardy-Mittell.
Wertz was the first to speak, citing the U.S. Youth Climate Strike Organization and pleading support for the Green New Deal, an immediate halt to fossil fuel infrastructure, and mandatory inclusion of climate change in U.S. education systems.
“This is more of a prayer than anything else,” said Wertz, urging local leaders and government officials to listen and act on the cries from America’s youth. “We are asking for your actions. We are asking for your vote, your body, your tongue, your arms and wrists and your will. That’s what we need to make the change that needs to happen.”
Cora Kircher spoke next, framing climate change as a present threat.
“This can’t be a future-centered movement alone because [climate change] is happening right now,” she said. Kircher hosted a minute of silence for people currently experiencing the effects of climate change, as well as for the Abenaki people, “whose land we are occupying.”
Asa Skinder ’22.5 spoke third, informing protesters about the State Government’s hesitance to confirm the ESSEX Plan, a state initiative to produce low-cost clean energy to Vermonters. In a state that spends 8% of its GDP on fossil fuels, Skinder believes Vermont isn’t doing nearly enough to limit its use of these resources.
“In Vermont, we often feel like we are in an environmentally responsible place, but if you look at the actions of our leaders in the House and Senate, that’s not true,” Skinder said. “They may not be climate change deniers, but they are climate delayers.”
Middlebury Union High School Alumna Greta Hardy-Mittell broke up the largely political discourse by reading an anecdote of her time in the Amazon Rainforest in December of last year.
“The suffocating fear of climate change followed me even to the most remote and pristine location on earth,” she said. “I could only think about how it is all going to fade away.”
Kircher capped the event by fiercely arguing that climate change is a complex issue, comprised of matters of social prejudice and conservative economic policy.
“In order to fight the climate crisis, we have to pursue a radical politics that recognizes that climate change isn’t separate from white supremacy, capitalism and an extractive economy and culture based on commodity accumulation and the exploitation of natural resources and other human beings,” she said.
The crowd dispersed around 12:30 p.m. after a last applause for all four speakers. Many felt satisfied with the event.
“There was a great turn out,” said Cat La Roche ’21. “I really didn’t expect this many people.”
To learn more about The Youth Climate Strike Organization, visit youthclimatestrikeus.org.
(02/28/19 11:34am)
MIDDLEBURY – When I walked in, it very well looked like Dan Freeman had been in the same spot for most of the day, hunched over his workbench, aligning pieces of dark brown leather together, with nothing but the odd gust of wind bristling against his north-facing window to distract him.
“I’m working a little harder than I usually do,” he said, reaching for his glue well. “I talked my doctor into getting a pair of handmade shoes, and it turns out he’s really particular.” Freeman smirked and brushed a layer of glue on the pressed edges. “I’m already on my fourth model with him.”
Freeman wears a tucked-in faded button-down, an aged pair of blue jeans and a leather waist-apron, scratched by edge-bevelers and saturated with dye. His sandy-white mustache is reminiscent of the one your grandfather had, and his straight hair is long enough to creep in front of his round eyeglasses, an annoyance which he frequently attends to by combing his bangs to the side.
“I am good at the 2D to 3D visualizations, and the small motor skills,” he said. “Athletics and academics — not so much. But we all have things we’re good at, and I guess I was lucky enough to find it.”
Of course, Freeman did not “find” shoemaking immediately. His bent for the craft began when he failed out of Duke University as a sophomore and was subsequently drafted into the United States Army as a mortar gunner stationed at Coleman Barracks, outside of Mannheim, Germany.
“It was never fun being in the army,” Freeman said, “but I look back on it now and I have nothing to complain about. It taught me that if you don’t take steps to control your fate, someone else will take them for you, and you might not like what they choose.”
A soldier in 1968, Freeman considered himself lucky not to have fought in Vietnam, where the majority of American draftees were sent at the time. In the spring of 1970, the Philadelphia native finished his deployment, and quickly began work at a friend’s sandal shop in Chapel Hill, N.C., only a stone’s throw away from his old college town.
“We over-engineered everything and made it all simple and durable. There was traction for that then,” he said. “People liked things that were handmade and rugged.” While working in Chapel Hill, Freeman met his future wife, a Vermont native and self-funded master’s student at the University of North Carolina. In a few years, the couple moved back up to Vermont, first settling in the town of Plainfield, and then, only a year later, in Middlebury.
“That’s how it all started,” Freeman said.
It was around this time in the mid-1970’s that Freeman decided he wanted to make shoes for a living. By chance, he was connected with a Jamaican boot maker living in New Orleans through a serendipitous conversation with a university student visiting the college town one summer. After sending a letter down to Louisiana, he took a risk and rode a Greyhound bus 1,700 miles to New Orleans, in hopes of an apprenticeship.
“When you’re 28, you’re brave like that. I found the guy in his repair shop and there were all these beautiful shoes laying around. I told him, ‘I want to learn how to make shoes,’ and he said, ‘Son, I want you to go away. Don’t waste my time.’ I hung around New Orleans for three weeks, and I finally convinced him I was serious. He said he would take me on as an apprentice and teach me everything he knew.”
During his subsequent training, Freeman’s wife taught in the city. After years of work, they moved back to Middlebury in 1986, where Freeman started “Leather Brothers.” Within the year it became “The Leatherworks,” as the town now knows it.
For more than three decades, Freeman has owned the shop on 2 Park Street, fashioning leather footwear for customers that have special orthotic requirements, and for those who just appreciate a boot made to last a lifetime.
His operation is tight: with a retail space of a few hundred square feet, and a similarly sized workshop behind the counter, there’s not a lot of extra room to dance. In the back of the store is a pantry, where Freeman keeps his fine leather rolled and stored. Wooden and plastic casts, reminiscent of mummified feet, fill every crack and crevice of shelf space, and Freeman has hundreds more hidden away in storage. A collection of sewing machines near the counter, a leather splitter, an anvil dangling near the edge of an old wooden side table and a leather sander covered with old Phillies stickers, make meandering through the shop feel like venturing through a maze.
“A real shoemaker could make a pair (of shoes) with a knife and fork,” he joked, admitting to the amount of modern equipment in the shop.
Beyond the charming aesthetics of Freeman’s studio machinery and the shiny boots that almost display themselves on the racks, the business of shoemaking is a combination of oddity, rarity and novelty. In an industry with very low supply, and subsequent low demand, to the untrained eye, Freeman’s work may seem financially unsuccessful and doomed for closure, like many adjacent small businesses in Middlebury.
“In the summer, I might have ten or fifteen customers come in to the store (daily),” Freeman said, implying each visitor might take a look at the collection of belts and other miscellaneous leather goods he retails in-house. “Any sale in here is usually $50 or $60, which is usually enough to pay rent for that day.” The winter months see a huge decline, and Freeman admits some days he has no retail customers open his door. However, the stagnancy of Middlebury’s retail industry doesn’t bother him for a few reasons.
“When I go visit my family in Philly, every time I go into a store, the clerks are short-tempered, and the drivers are too,” he said. “They are getting abused all day. If you are constantly fighting other drivers and rude people yelling at you, it’s going to affect your personality. When you don’t interact with more people and they are friendlier, it’s just easier and it makes you nicer. And you’re nicer to other people.”
But don’t be fooled by the silence of Freeman’s shop, because behind this façade of an empty Vermont storefront lies the truth that Freeman can’t keep up with the custom orders put on his business.
“I make shoes all day,” he said. There’s a list of names hidden on the far side of one of the shop’s supporting beams that Freeman calls his “A list”: the customers who have purchased at least two pairs from him. Consider his “B list,” then, a group double the length that have bought a single pair from him.
Leatherworks has an established reputation, and, combined with the slow, time-consuming process of making shoes, Freeman has built a — somewhat — stable life for himself that requires him to show up to work every day and get his leather apron a little dirtier.
“It really is not a great business plan,” he admitted. “You need a lot of knowledge, and even with the high prices, you cannot really make much of a profit. However, I’m not complaining. When (customers) put on their shoes, smile, and get out their checkbook, that’s what I work for. I need that check too, but what I work for is making shoes that people like to wear, and wear them all the time.”
(11/29/18 10:56am)
Winter is here. If anyone needs proof, at four in the morning last Thursday, it was three degrees Fahrenheit in Middlebury, which is now the town’s coldest recorded temperature for a Thanksgiving Day. For the hundreds of Addison County residents who make up the county’s homeless population, enduring these mornings and nights must be done without permanent housing. And with the deep dive into winter, conditions can become life-threatening. Last January, former Middlebury employee Suad Teocanin froze to death mere steps away from the shelter of the Charter House in town, where he had been living.
To raise awareness of the dangers of winter homelessness, The John Graham Shelter, based in Vergennes, will host their 5th annual “Vigil and Sleep-Out” this Saturday, Dec 1.
[pullquote speaker="CHRIS SCHEMBRY" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]It really just put a lot of things in perspective.[/pullquote]
The idea is simple: pitch tents on the Marble Works Green, and for one night, anyone who wishes can sleep outside in bitter conditions to show solidarity for and support people experiencing homelessness.
“The best way I can describe the Sleep-Out is it’s like Relay for Life, but instead of walking at night we’re sleeping outside,” said Chris Schembry, service coordinator at the John Graham Shelter.
Schembry emphasized that the night-long event coincides with heavy fundraising efforts by the Shelter, which will all directly benefit the homeless they support throughout the year. Donations from individuals and organizations now total over $43,000, leading into this weekend. The current fundraising goal is set at $45,000 and the Shelter is hoping to reach that number by Saturday.
“This is the third year I am working with the shelter for the sleep out, and we typically raise somewhere between $40,000 and $45,000,” said Schembry.
The event itself begins at 4 p.m., with a Candlelight Vigil on the Middlebury Town Green. The Sleep-Out begins later that evening. As an employee of the shelter, Schembry commented on the overnight from personal experience. “I didn’t sleep much,” said Schembry.“It really just put a lot of things in perspective.” For the homeless population, he said, “That’s their normal. That’s what they have to do every day. ”
For more information on how to fundraise and participate in the “Sleep-Out”, visit www.johngrahamshelter.org.
(11/08/18 10:57am)
MIDDLEBURY — The July passage of marijuana legalization in Vermont has had an impact on not only future use of the drug, but past offenses as well. Vermont State’s Attorneys Dennis Wygmans and David Cahill estimate there are now roughly 2,800 Vermont residents with expungeable cannabis convictions. In other words, residents who were previously convicted of a cannabis possession charge that is now allowed under new state laws can have these charges expunged.
David Cahill, Windsor County State’s Attorney, released this estimate earlier in the year, by tallying cases where charges could potentially be expunged due to the changing laws in annual state reports since 2008. Recently, Vermonters have begun to have their charges expunged due to the efforts of many local organizations and attorneys to help residents expunge their own cannabis misdemeanors, including those in Addison County.
Last month, State’s Attorney Dennis Wygmans teamed up with pro bono attorney Dave Silberman to do just this: organize and host expungement clinics to assist county residents in filing petitions to clear qualifying cannabis charges from their records. Silberman, a longtime drug reform citizen’s advocate, specifically designed these clinics for cannabis-related expungements.
[pullquote speaker="DAVE SILBERMAN " photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]Those of us who’ve been unfairly targeted in the past can finally clear our records and no longer have to worry about the lifetime of negative repercussions.[/pullquote]
“Vermont has already decided, as a state, that growing and using marijuana shouldn’t be a crime, and yet so many people continue to carry the burdens of their previous convictions,” said Silberman, in a press release sent out early last month. “By obtaining expungement, those of us who’ve been unfairly targeted in the past can finally clear our records and no longer have to worry about the lifetime of negative repercussions that past arrests continue to have on our job prospects, eligibility for federal benefits like student loans and our general standing in the community.”
Silberman told The Campus that organizing these clinics was fairly straightforward.
“We had to find volunteer attorneys from Vermont Legal Aid and Vermont Law School Center for Justice Reform and folks who actually know how to process expungements,” Silberman said. He held two Middlebury clinics in October, the first in the Frank Mahady Courthouse, and the second at the college’s Kirk Alumni Center. These events provided a start-to-finish expungement filing process, including free consultation from Vermont Legal Aid Volunteer Attorneys.
“A lot of people don’t know that expungement is available to them. Having a clinic raises awareness that this is an option,” Silberman said. While the expungement process can be done individually, Silberman and Wygmans understood why convicted residents may not undertake it on their own. Filing a petition can be difficult. “Even though the forms are relatively straightforward, a lot of folks are really uncomfortable with pro se representation (or self-representation) in the legal system,” he said.
There are financial barriers as well.
“If you had a criminal defense attorney for your previous conviction, sure you could go back to that person, but that attorney will say, ‘Okay, that’s an hour and a half of my time, and that will be $350,’” Silberman said. “Here, we have pro bono attorneys doing this at no fee.”
Residents need to pay $90 to file for an expungement petition, Silberman said. In an effort to address this, the executive director of the PennyWise foundation, Laura Subin, offered fee scholarships at the clinics for qualifying residents.
“Current requirements that individuals file a petition and pay the courts a $90 fee are huge barriers to some, hurting most those who have the least,” said Subin. “PennyWise is proud to stand up and say ‘This is wrong,’ and we hope to be involved in legislative advocacy that will make expungement of eligible crimes happen automatically and for free.”
Relieving financial barriers might increase the clinics’ success rates. “We had folks here fifteen minutes before we even opened,” Silberman said. At the first round of expungements at Frank Mahady Courthouse, Wygmans says 20 county residents attended and at least 12 were able to file for expungement. The documents were sent to the courts for approval.
Saturday’s clinic felt similar. Silberman greeted attendees at the door of Kirk Alumni Center on the edge of Middlebury’s campus. Residents signed in and then discussed their potential filing with members of Vermont Legal Aid. Wygmans was present, as well as Middlebury student volunteers from the college’s Pre-Law Association.
Other Vermont counties have offered similar expungement events in the past six months. Cahill is another leader in cannabis misdemeanor rollback efforts.
“Props are due to Dennis Wygmans,” Cahill said, commenting on the continuing efforts from the Addison County State’s Attorney office to hold expungement events. “The key is to repeat these clinics.”
Cahill explained that Windsor County has hosted driver’s license suspension and cannabis misdemeanor expungement clinics, and hopes to hold other drug related expungement events in the future. In fact, Middlebury’s expungement clinics, although focused on relieving cannabis charges, welcomed residents with “any and all” qualifying charges for expungement. Vermont Legal Aid’s website says the qualifying offenses are four specific felony charges including almost all misdemeanors as well as “Felony Burglary (not in a home), Grand Larceny, Prescription Fraud and Criminal Mischief.”
Silberman described his motivations in simple terms. “The plain fact of the matter is that cannabis prohibition has and is a tool of racial oppression. It is not just good enough to end it; we have to reverse it,” he said. “There is a historical wrong here that needs to be corrected, and these expungement clinics are a small step in correcting that wrong.”
(10/25/18 9:56am)
Over Labor Day weekend, Vice President Mike Pence and his wife, Second Lady Karen Pence, were photographed at a “creemee” stand in Sudbury, Vermont, 20 miles southwest of Middlebury. The couple spent three days in Vermont on an impromptu vacation at Lake Hortonia in Hubbardton. In the photograph, the two wear shorts and T-shirts and hold soft-serve ice creams outside in the soft yellow light of late summer.
Now, the bill. The Vermont Department of Public Safety (DPS) has released running estimates of the cost of the Pences’ visit. According to coverage from VTDigger, The DPS estimates $106,825 in payroll costs, a number that continues to grow as the office accounts for more expenses. The hefty weekend costs derive from the efforts of the Vermont State Police, who worked closely with federal security during the visit. Public Information Officer of the Vermont State Police Adam Silverman spoke to The Campus last week about the state’s responsibility for security during executive visits.
“Generally speaking, the logistics of a visit to Vermont by a head of state are complicated and require extensive planning and coordination among multiple federal, state and local law-enforcement agencies,” Silverman said. “The Vermont State Police was heavily involved in the vice president’s visit to Vermont.”
Although the federal government relies on state police for assistance, the state may not be responsible for the associated costs. But, in an interview with VTDigger, Silverman said that “there would not be reimbursement” from the federal level, which means costs would fall to Vermont taxpayers.
Although the costs are continuing to roll in, and much of the sum may fall to state taxpayers for payment, Pence’s visit was memorable and important for many Vermont residents, including the owners of The Sudbury Shoppe, where Mike and Karen Pence were photographed with their creemees.
“We had a nice visit with him and his wife, as did our customers,” said the shop owners last week. The Sudbury Shoppe posted a photo of the Pences on their Facebook page on Sept. 2, captioned, “I had the privilege of serving them their first and only VT Maple Creemee, thank you Mr. & Mrs. Vice President.”
More information on the cost of the Pences’ visit may be available in the coming months through the Department of Public Records.
(10/04/18 10:00am)
MIDDLEBURY — Middlebury resident Amy McAninch hopes town legislature will soon pass a bill that would prohibit local retailers from providing customers with single-use plastic bags at checkout. With the help of roughly a dozen volunteers, McAninch has successfully completed a town petition as of September, bringing her proposal one step closer to being voted on in Middlebury’s annual town meeting in March of next year.
The initiative began last spring, when McAninch realized other New England towns were passing similar bans on plastic products, specifically plastic grocery bags. She described the somewhat epiphanic moment she experienced after reading a letter to the editor in a local paper on the subject.
“What’s the matter with Vermont? We should be doing this,” McAninch said.
Soon after McAninch started organizing the petition, Amelia Miller, now a junior at Middlebury College studying environmental science, stumbled into McAninch’s project through a research assignment in her Environmental Policy class.
She said the initiative was right up her alley. “My parents hate shopping with me, because I refuse to use plastic bags,” Miller said. “I will carry things out with my hands.”
Miller was able to connect with McAninch through her professor, and things just felt right after that, Miller said. The two began working in tandem to formulate a town petition and spread word of their efforts. Their specific request? To halt retailers in town from providing bags with a thickness of less than four mils, or .0004 inches. Typical single-use plastic bags are one to two mils thick.
“Four mils is the difference between single-use plastic and reusable bags,” Miller said. Miller and McAninch hope that with a thickness minimum at four mils, any plastic bags that retailers can supply will be too expensive to be single-use, and will incentivize customers to use their own reusable bags. However, the ruling would not inhibit retailers from providing plastic packaging as part of a product, nor the sale of plastic bags and other plastic products. Although the ban would only knock out a specific moment in which one type of plastic product is used, McAninch and Miller believe a plastic ban of any magnitude could have larger implications.
“The goal is not to solve the plastic problem. Everything is plastic. We live in a plastic world,” Miller said. “The ban will create a conversation about how plastic is used in all aspects of our lives.”
Maggie Eaton, a volunteer for the initiative, agreed that this project is about “protecting downstream damage that these bags do.” She decided to volunteer her time for the proposal because of how much she sees the effects of plastic-product waste daily, even in Vermont.
For McAninch, a ban of this scope would show our plastic-product dependency. “There’s no doubt it’s convenient. It’s too convenient,” she said. “It takes effort to wean yourself off.”
Since their initial introduction last spring, McAninch and Miller have collected signatures from over 5 percent of town voters, the amount needed in order to receive a spot on the town ballot. To collect signatures, McAninch and Miller’s strategy involves standing outside the Middlebury Foods Co-op on Washington Street, attending public town events and holding a booth at the Middlebury Farmers’ Market on Saturday mornings.
McAninch said the reception has been quite positive, and estimated that 85-90 percent of all Middlebury residents she asked have signed the petition. She guessed that she currently has over 300 signatures. Eaton said the next step is contacting merchants and letting them know there is a possibility of a plastic ban in an act of “preparation.”
Middlebury is now added to the list of Vermont towns where residents have or are attempting to ban single-use plastic bags from retail locations. This list includes Brattleboro, the first Vermont town to enforce a similar ban on plastic bags, which went into effect this July. McAninch hopes that with more towns banning these bags, it will put an impetus on Montpelier to pass legislation. Pertinent bills addressing plastic usage have been floating around the Vermont State House for a few years now.
As for herself, McAninch will keep collecting signatures until her petition is filed, and is looking toward March 2019, when the proposal has a chance to be voted on by residents.
“I just feel outraged — we’re just drowning in this,” she said. “It seems to me there just has to be some quantum leap in our conscience about what we’re doing to the Earth.”