VCP board member has worked tirelessly on nonprofit’s expansion

I would like to correct a grievous omission.

As stated in Alyssa Grosso's article, the Vermont Center for Photography is moving to 24 High St. in Brattleboro. Chris Triebert, the longest-serving member of the board of the VCP, is responsible for finding and designing this new space, generating a workable floor plan that meets VCP multiple functions: gallery, darkroom, digital classroom, library, printing and scanning facility, and thrift store.

Chris has raised a huge portion of the money needed for the move.The expanded VCP location would not be a reality if it was not for her dedication, determination and intelligence.

She has worked tirelessly to create an exciting venue for VCP.

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Remember the women

So many women have paid the ultimate price as warriors, nurses, and prisoners. May they be remembered on Memorial Day, and may the unsung contributions of women during conflict worldwide be recognized and valued.

They were nurses, soldiers, code breakers, factory workers, resistance fighters, prisoners of war, victims. They were women. And we should remember them on Memorial Day. Women have been warriors throughout history. During the Civil War, they assumed male aliases, wore men's uniforms, and charged into battle on both sides.

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Brattleboro sets policy for dependent care

With new reimbursements for dependent care, a large raise in stipends, and a more regular pay schedule, the Selectboard advances a goal set at Annual Representative Town Meeting: to make it possible for people to attend board meetings with much less financial stress

In an effort to make serving on the Selectboard easier and to break some of the financial barriers to town government leadership, the town will begin reimbursing its members for child care and elder care. In the new fiscal year, which begins July 1, board members will be able...

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Conservation District offers webinars for landowners

The Windham County Natural Resources Conservation District is offering a series of free webinars aimed at helping current and prospective landowners manage their properties to protect southern Vermont's natural resources. These programs are the result of collaboration with the Lake Champlain Sea Grant, UVM Extension, the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation, and the Southeast Vermont Cooperative Invasive Species Management Association. Upcoming free webinars include: • Mapping Tools for Landowners: Use your smartphone to map invasive species on your property, plan...

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Immigration issues force clergy, parish realignments for local Roman Catholic churches

Significant clergy and parish realignments within the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington were recently announced in a number of communities as a result of changes to U.S. immigration policies and processes. As a result, some Vermont parishes will be without a resident priest - including Our Lady of Mercy in Putney - for at least the next year. Two local parishes and chapels will see clergy transfers effective July 1. Rev. Henry Furman, pastor of St. Luke and Ascension Parishes...

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‘Wind Beneath Our Wings’ benefits Bellows Falls Woman’s Club projects

With COVID-19 restrictions, the Bellows Falls Woman's Club's May Tea fundraiser has been cancelled for the second year. To support ongoing projects such as local scholarships and awards, women's health and domestic violence awareness, and community improvements, the BFWC says it has teamed up with Village Square Booksellers and Friends of the Rockingham Public Library to offer Wind Beneath Our Wings, a tribute to those who have helped the community through these difficult pandemic months. Wind Beneath Our Wings provides...

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Who have we become, indeed?

Elayne Clift's column begs some questions, as does David Gray's Facebook post, which she quotes. There are ridiculous reasons to be stopped by the police, including hanging an air freshener on your rearview mirror, having an expired car registration, having too much of your license plate covered, etc. Let's all ask ourselves: Who created these laws? Why can falling behind on property taxes, even in a paid-off home, result in a person being thrown into the streets, increasing homelessness? Why...

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Around the Towns

VFW seeks baby supplies for families of deployed soldiers BRATTLEBORO - VFW Post 1034, 40 Black Mountain Rd., is a dropoff point for Operation Homefront's Star Spangled Babies Shower. Operation Homefront is a nonprofit that assists low-income military families. The Vermont National Guard is facing its biggest deployment in 15 years, where service members are leaving their families behind for a year or longer. Many of these family members are new mothers, and some are first-time mothers. Organizers of the...

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St. Michael’s Episcopal will hold Sunday services at Christ Church

St. Michael's Episcopal Church is offering outdoor worship - not at its Bradley Avenue home, but on the grounds of Christ Church on Route 5 in Guilford, known as St. Michael's Mother Church. All Sunday services, weekly at 8 and 10:15 a.m., will be held at Christ Church, weather permitting, through the months of warm weather ahead. “As many remember, we experienced outdoor worship at Christ Church last summer and fall and it was really great to be together,” St.

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Rockingham Meeting House opens for season

The Rockingham Meeting House will open for the 2021 season on Saturday, May 29. Visitors are welcome daily through Indigenous Peoples' Day (Monday, Oct. 11), from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Constructed between 1787 and 1801, the meeting house is a designated National Historic Landmark and the oldest public building in Vermont that still exists in a condition close to its original state. It served as both a place of worship and the Town Hall until 1869, when it was...

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Milestones

College news • The following local students graduated from St. Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y., on April 18: Emma E. Griffith of Halifax, graduated Cum Laude with a B.S. in psychology and business in the liberal arts, and Mikayla G. Lathrop of South Londonderry graduated Cum Laude with a B.S. in environmental studies-mathematics. • Dominic Italia, a 2012 graduate of Brattleboro Union High School, earned his White Coat as he completed year two of his four year Creighton University School...

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Mini-disc-golf event, raffle benefit Prouty Center

The Winston Prouty Center's biggest fundraiser of the year, Par for the Cause, will be held in June. Event organizers have made supporting the nonprofit's programs for children and families fun with daily raffle prizes throughout June and a decorated mini-disc-golf game on Saturday and Sunday, June 26 and 27. Tickets are now available for the Prize-a-Day Raffle. Each day in June two winners will be selected, with total prizes valuing over $2,900. Prizes include gift certificates to a wide...

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A classic quartet in its prime

The Vermont Jazz Center will complete its 2020-21 livestream season with a concert by the highly acclaimed Immanuel Wilkins Quartet on Saturday, June 5, at 8 p.m. This young group has been a solid, performing ensemble for four years. Its members, each in his early to mid-20s, have been touring, recording, and creating together since their teens. The musicians are Immanuel Wilkins (compositions and alto saxophone), Micah Thomas (piano), Daryl Johns (bass) and Kweku Sumbry (drums). The quartet's debut recording,

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Anna Schuleit Haber will discuss her art in BMAC Zoom presentation

Why would an artist choose to fill an abandoned psychiatric hospital with 28,000 potted plants and 5,000 square feet of sod? And having decided to do so, how exactly would she go about pulling that off? Artist Anna Schuleit Haber will answer those questions and more in a free Zoom presentation hosted by the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC) on Friday, May 28, at 7:30 p.m. Originally from Mainz, Germany, Haber graduated from the Northfield Mount Hermon School, earned...

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Town Arts Fund awards second round of grants

The Arts Council of Windham County (ACWC) has announced the second round of grantees for this year's Brattleboro Town Arts Fund program. Nine community-focused creative initiatives were selected from a competitive field of proposals received in this second round of funding this year. In a news release, TAF members describe the group as promoting “the development and presentation of creative projects that contribute positively to the greater community and to the vibrancy and diversity of Brattleboro's arts and cultural landscape.”

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Bellows Falls artists invite public into their studios on Memorial Day weekend

This Memorial Day weekend, May 29 and 30, local artists will continue the annual statewide open studio tour tradition. Art in Bellows Falls, a collective of artists will gather at 33 Bridge St. in that village. There, visitors will find Chris Sherwin and Nick Kekic in their glass studios, Scott Morgan's painting, and Judy Lidie's handmade soaps. For just this weekend, Clare Adams will offer painted glass, and Jeanette Staley will show her collage, home decor, and more. Others may...

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Play on

When last I saw Leland & Gray softball coach Tammy Clausen, it was April 30 and her team was facing Bellows Falls, who were playing their first home game since the death of teammate Jada Spaulding Boyle in an April 25 car crash. We talked about how hard it was for high-schoolers to lose a teammate so suddenly. Little did both of us know that, three weeks later, Clausen and her team would again be paying tribute to an athlete...

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Finnish cartoonist subject of biopic

Beginning at sundown on Friday, June 4, Epsilon Spires will project the Finnish film Tove (2020) in the parking lot of the historic First Baptist Church building at 190 Main St. This Covid-safe event, which takes place at the end of Gallery Walk, will feature refreshments by Madame Jo's crêperie from Trollhaugen Farm in Newfane, and an introductory presentation by Jo Dery, associate professor of film studies at Keene State College. The first in a series of weekly film screenings...

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Good deed accomplished

I passed her as she staggered out of the culvert by the side of Route 30. She seemed in distress, so I turned around on my bike and dismounted. I wasn't sure if this snapper's eyes were open until I saw them tear, then take me in - wondering, I suspect, if I meant her harm. I guessed that she was about 20 years old. I wondered if she had eggs in her, if this chance encounter might be the...

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‘Kids must be fed, no matter what’

Despite statewide school closures that resulted in overnight changes for families and school staff, school nutrition professionals stepped up every day to ensure our community remained fed. What a challenging year this has been for everyone working in school kitchens! School communities throughout Windham County are grateful for these unsung heroes in the community who nourish children each day. Last spring, while teachers, students, and families were making the difficult shift to remote learning, these food service professionals continued to...

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A collaborator in compassion

As tributes continue to pour in about Peter Elwell following the announcement of his retirement as Brattleboro's Town Manager at the end of the year, we have been hearing lots about his remarkable efforts in financial planning over his six- year tenure and about his commitment to human resource development. But perhaps beyond anything else, Peter's tenure has been one of deep personal engagement with our community, his community, an engagement characterized by deep and abiding compassion. When Brattleboro voted...

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Emerging from our cocoons

Gingerly emerging from isolation or raring to go, folks have different ways of getting back to pre-pandemic socializing and activities, and many are experiencing at least some level of anxiety in doing so. Gov. Phil Scott says that state pandemic restrictions can be lifted ahead of the Vermont Forward target date of July 4, if the state vaccination rate reaches 80 percent of eligible Vermonters (those age 12 and older). That threshold could be met as soon as the middle...

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Show of a lifetime

On Saturday, May 29, a new show - a particularly important one - goes up at Mitchell-Giddings Fine Arts. “Jackie Abrams: 45 Years of Making” brings together basketry from the Brattleboro artist's many series over her lifetime, from the traditional basketry of her early years to works in her “Precarious Shelters” series - more symbols of those shapes that hold our lives, as baskets hold our objects. Over the past 45 years, Abrams has collaborated with glass artist Josh Bernbaum...

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COVID-19 cases fall as more get the vaccine

Vermont could see the end of nearly all COVID-19 restrictions weeks ahead of schedule. All it will take is about 18,000 more Vermonters to get vaccinated against the virus in the coming days. At his May 21 news briefing, Gov. Phil Scott said that when 80 percent of Vermont's eligible population - those age 12 and older - have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, the state will enter Step 4 of the Vermont Forward plan and...

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