Activists in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont are asking police to enforce existing laws against loud motorcycles. “Motorcycles come out of the factory quiet,” Ted Rueter told the Valley Post. “People illegally modify them so they make more noise.” Rueter works for Noise Free America, a group with chapters in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont and a web site at www.NoiseFree.org.

Bullying by bosses leads some workers to commit acts of violence, and causes stress-related health problems in many more workers. Massachusetts is poised to become the first state in the nation to pass a law against workplace bullying. Vermont is likely to pass similar legislation next year. Legislation in New Hampshire is stalled.

Vermont Governor Jim Douglas announced on August 27 he will not seek re-election next year. He cited personal reasons for the decision. The news may affect the future of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant.

Vermont Yankee is three miles from Massachusetts and a stone’s throw from New Hampshire. It’s owned by Entergy Corp. of Louisiana. Residents of towns near the reactor have voted repeatedly to close it.

"A tribe like no other: An African-American woman sets out to learn organic farming and gets more than she bargains for" Bellows Falls -- From a balcony overlooking the pristine flow of water at the base of rolling Fall Mountain, I observe a swirl of colors and register a happy cacophony of sounds.

Vermont governor Jim Douglas says he wants more ATVs and other motorized vehicles in state parks. In recent weeks, more than a thousand people wrote to Douglas and his employees about his plan. As of July 1, the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources had received 148 letters and about 1,600 e-mails about the proposal. The writers opposed the rule by about 3 to 1.

But at a public hearing in June in Montpelier, about 250 people showed up to support Douglas's plan, far outnumbering opponents.

The comment period ends on July 6. Contact info is at www.anr.state.vt.us/site/html/contact.htm

On June 24, Vermont governor Jim Douglas personally lobbied President Obama to reject universal health care. “This governor does not represent the wishes of the people of Vermont,” said Richard Davis, director of the Guilford, Vermont-based www.universalhealthvt.org Guilford borders Brattleboro.

Meanwhile, the Burlington Free Press newspaper reported that the number of people working at the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources is down almost 10 percent over the last six months. Douglas eliminated 58 jobs in the agency. That number includes 11 people laid off between June 22 and June 24.

Vermont Governor Jim Douglas on May 22 vetoed a bill that would have required Entergy Corporation of Louisiana to pay for cleaning up the mess it made at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant. On June 3, Vermont Senate president Peter Shumlin of Putney said the legislature will wait until January 2010 to try to override Douglas's veto.

Anti-nuclear march, Brattleboro, 2008. photo by Eesha Williams (click to enlarge)

In a victory for middle class workers and farmers, the Vermont legislature on June 2 voted to override governor Jim Douglas's veto of the $4.5 billion state budget. No governor had ever vetoed the budget. In his own budget proposal, offered in January, Douglas attempted to hide a major tax increase: $63 million dollars in new property taxes. His budget would have frozen the state’s education reimbursements at last year’s levels, even though most Vermont towns have already passed school budgets for next year.

In an address to Congress on February 24, President Barack Obama stated, “You don’t need to hear another list of statistics to know our economy is in crisis, because you live it everyday. It’s the worry you wake up with, and the source of sleepless nights.”